HD 'The French Connection'
by tigersilver
Summary: 2010 Travel Fest Ficcage! AU; EWE. Draco Malfoy, Junior Attache to the Wizarding F.O. must travel thru' France sans Magic. Oddly enough, he stumbles over Harry Potter more often than not, to both his delight and dismay.
1. Boom!

_**FIC: The French Connection**_  
**Title:** The French Connection  
**Author:** **tigersilver**  
**Prompt Number:** #100 by **emerish**  
**Travel Destination:** France  
**Rating:** NC-17  
**Pairing(s):** Harry/Draco  
**Summary:** Draco Malfoy, a Very Junior Attaché for Wizarding Foreign Office, is selected as a diplomatic courier to ferry a highly dangerous Magical Item through Muggle France. Unable to use his wand, or any magic at all, he stumbles into difficulties here and there...as well as one Potter, Harry, Draco's ancient Arch-Nemesis from Hogwarts. Potter proves to be terribly helpful and concerned for a reputed Arch-Nemesis, however. What _ever_ could possibly be the reason for that?  
**Warnings:** EWE, AU, and other than that, none. Well...crack. Possible crack. No..._definite crack_. Oh - and snogging! And assorted evil puns, sly innuendo and underhanded references, but I do possess a license to carry, I swear. Trust me.  
**Word Count:** 26,000+/-  
BETAS! **avenalanon** **lonerofthepack** **8dreamcatcher8**  
**Author's Notes:** It's not _exactly_ (to the letter) what you've requested, dearest Emerish, but still in the general vicinity, I hope. I hope, too, that you find it the slightest bit enjoyable. Or passable. Or... _not_ awful. T'would be _formidable_, as the Muggles say! Toodles & _au revoir_, Anon.

**00oo00**

_**I'll see you at the seaside sandbox for the well-to-do, where two 'villes' are one; I'll watch you cavort amongst the rhinos and gorillas, amidst waving palm fronds; I'll delight as Flora serenades you, her waters lulling you sweetly. And then, my hopefully still-unDampened friend, I'll relieve you of your precious burden...completely. **_

~~~ extract from the rather daft instructions provided the British Wizarding Ministry as to the proper procedure for return of one Magical Item, borrowed, from Mr. Chomondeley Screwbik, noted inventor (and, quite arguably, certifiable lunatic).

0O0

**To:** Minister Kingsley Shacklebolt  
**Status:** For Your Eyes Only  
**Dossier Document (Shred or Incendio after)**  
Harry James Potter, known to his friends and confidantes as 'Harry', is a graduate of the Hogwarts school (Cum Magna Laude, as Mr. Potter revealed in an interview that he'd found it much easier to concentrate on his studies when the continual death threats from Lord Voldemort [aka He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, 'You-Know-Who', and Thomas Marvolo Riddle, deceased] ended in 1999, and later, the London School for Covert Operatives (Muggle), from which he matriculated with First Honours.

Mr. Potter is approximately 5' 9'', is a dark-hued brunet, Caucasian and of English antecedents, has distinctive green eyes and an equally distinctive facial scar, located on his forehead, just above brow level. He is fluent in several languages and has earned advanced degrees in various Muggle martial arts, as well as being highly skilled in the arts of disguise and concealment. He is also a notable Wizarding dueler and is skilled in fencing. Mr. Potter possesses a Cloak of Invisibility, which he has kindly agreed to use on the job. Mr. Potter, or more familiarly, 'Harry', is currently the founding operative in the division known as _M13_, the recently-established Wizarding Secret Service, which functions as an adjunct to the Ministry with the goal of suppressing or eliminating threats to international Wizarding security.

Mr. Potter generally prefers to work by himself, under cover, and has assiduously developed a public persona of a mild-mannered, dilettante, mid-level philanthropist for purposes of concealing his real mission. Mr. Potter has also recently expressed a desire to expand the ranks of the M13 to include several other somewhat questionable Wizards and Witches he feels would be valuable contributors in the effort to maintain peace and good will between nations.

As a matter of additional interest, the Wizarding M13 is in accord and cooperates with several key Muggle institutions of similar nature: the M5 and M6 of the British Muggle government, the Interpol, the American CIA and France's Direction générale de la sécurité extérieur. A wide variety of national security agencies also loosely participate in the cooperative consortium, notably those of Romania, Japan, Bulgaria, China and the Commonwealth countries. Mr. Potter, as well as Ms. Hermione Granger, Mr. Justin Finch-Fletchley, socialite Pansy Parkinson, Mr. Blaise Zabini and Mr. Seamus Finnegan, Mr. Viktor Krum, Healer. Millicent Bulstrode, the entire extended Weasley family and a loosely banded-together group of families of strictly pure-blood extraction, previously tied to the practice of the Dark Arts but now reformed and redirected, have been instrumental in easing this effort to fruition. Cooperating members are issued special badges by the Ministry, bearing the seal and motto of the M13. The seal is of two flying beasts, rousant: draco argent displayed, phoenix or and gules, soaring. The motto of the M13 is: _Lumen draco nunquam occlude; phoenix adhuc ascensoris_. [The eye of the dragon never closeth; the phoenix also riseth.]

0O0

"Your mission, young Malfoy, should you choose to accept it," Arthur Weasley stated ominously, his pale blue eyes both serious and grim, "is to convey the Cube of Mystery back to its creator safely, without the use of magic. Also, that chair you're sitting on?"

"Yes?" Draco asked, determined to be polite no matter what the circumstances, for what else did a Very Junior Attaché to the Ministry's Foreign Office do but be unfailingly polite? "My chair, sir?"

"It'll self-destruct in five minutes," Mr. Weasley smiled genially. "But you should be perfectly safe till then, Mr. Malfoy. Plenty of time to read over the file on the Cube of Mystery. Tea?"

"Ah," Draco acknowledged this information impassively. Of course Arthur Weasley would have such a hazard in his office; he'd been promoted to the dual posts of Head of Muggle and Covert Operations Relations and Oversight of Oddball and Nutcase Inventions departments after the War, and he took his job in MACARONI (as the two related offices were _familiarly_ known in the Ministry) terribly seriously, often testing out the Oddball & Nutcase Inventions in the confines of his own private office. If the Minister for Magic (ex-Auror Kingsley Shacklebolt, and wasn't he just bloody impressive?) had asked him to be suitably grave and mysterious about what was a really only a simple courier job, then Arthur Weasley was the man to be mysterious. Not only did the man excel at charades, he honestly enjoyed them, Draco recalled, having done his homework on all the key personnel involved in this, his first official mission.

"Yes, thank you, Mr. Weasley. If you believe I'll have time enough to consume it before the chair explodes? Don't want to waste the Canteen's clean cups, sir."

Weasley also abhorred waste of any kind and was scrupulously frugal. Not at all surprising, given that great straggly ginger brood of his, Draco sneered - internally. Externally, he smiled charmingly.

"Ahahaha! Very amusing, m'boy!" Weasley chuckled, and then sobered instantly, once again donning his Head of MACARONI cap. "Are you a fast drinker, Draco? May I call you Draco, son?" Mr. Weasley wanted to know, but he was also at the same time tugging on an ornately tasselled bell pull, so that Draco wasn't certain if the query was rhetorical. A loaded tea tray appeared on the conference table between them almost instantaneously. "I find it pays to be efficient in all things and these Muggles really have that down to a science, don't they?" Weasley went on jovially, eyes twinkling. "Must admire them, mustn't we?"

"Yes, sir," Draco replied dutifully, shifting uneasily in his seat. He'd just about four minutes left, and counting. By his reckoning, at least. There were other chairs pulled up the conference table, but Mr. Weasley had ushered him to this particular one and he wasn't about to needlessly upset the man who was, in a manner of speaking, his temporary superior. Besides, Draco was young and quite spry and could dive out of danger with grace and panache. Was used to it, rather.

"Here we are!" Mr. Weasley grinned merrily over the silver-gilt Ministry-crested service, gleefully rubbing his hands together. "One Cube or two, Draco? Ahahah!"

Without ceremony, he used the sugar tongs to lift up a multi-coloured rectangular object, made of some smooth glossy substance. It was approximately a quarter the size of a teacup, and had shallow seams dividing the many-coloured squares that comprised it. Draco was able to have a much better look when it was plumped down in front of him, budged up against a stray slice of lemon on his saucer.

Apparently, Arthur Weasley had plumped on _him_ as well: Draco Malfoy, a really very Junior member of the Diplomatic Corps, as the perfect candidate for this delicate mission into foreign Muggle territory. Draco shook his head over that. As if he knew Muggles! But his job required he swot up if he wasn't familiar, and his duties extended to dealing kindly with Department Heads who were known to be barmy.

Plus, he owed the lot of Weasels a debt, and Draco damned well knew it. Upshot was, he'd be polite and he'd do what Mr. Weasley told him to, no matter the personal pain.

"Thank you, sir. Seeing as I'm now in possession of the Cube, I'll need the file as well, correct? That I may understand its particular powers?" He cocked an inquisitive brow at the older man and grimly hung on to his thinning patience by the very tip of its twitchy tail. Three minutes and counting. He'd not been informed of much of anything actually useful by his own boss, Gosselink Greygoose. Draco was beginning to clue in that that oversight might've been deliberate. "Wouldn't want to make silly mistakes, sir," he tacked on, looking suitably earnest, "by not knowing."

"Oh, absolutely you need all the pertinent details! And here you are, m'boy," Mr. Weasley replied cheerily, passing over a manila folder stamped variously _Danger!, Top Secret!_ and, curiously enough, _Eat Me!_

"'Eat me'?" Draco remarked, an eyebrow arching high. "Seriously, sir?"

"Fortunately, no. Not this time. It's our only copy, you know? Can't have it chewed to pieces, can we?"

"No, no," Draco managed, his face as bland as he could possibly manage in the face of such absurdity. "Of course not, Mr. Weasley. Er, you also mentioned filling me in personally, sir, in your Owl? In regards the Cube's creator, I assume?"

"Absolutely, son!" Weasley chuckled. "Yes, that'd be old Screwbik we're speaking of. Chomondeley Screwbik. He's of Prussian extraction; quite the genius madman type. Very hairy and peculiar these days; wears a great deal of extraneous lace, all shades of violet. He's visiting with relatives in France at the moment. That's where you'll be meeting up with him," Arthur Weasley advised Draco cheerily. "Care for a biscuit, son? They're m'wife's. Makes 'em specially for me."

"Don't mind if I do, sir."

Draco accepted the round of shortbread gracefully and then scooped up the dossier that lay untouched in front of him. He paged through at a rapid pace, well aware his chair time was ticking away, quickly committing to memory the salient gen. Included was a photo of a bear-like man, wearing a balaclava and bunchy velvet robes, along with an abnormally copious amount of inappropriate lavender-hued lace. He had bushy grey eyebrows, a bushy grey beard and mustachios, and masses of greying lank hair, curled into sausage ringlets. At first glance he looked to be a close relative of Rubeus Hagrid, but much the fouler of temper, judging by those impressively scowling brows.

Draco bit back a rueful sigh; mad Prussians were not whom he'd choose to associate with in the daily course of events. He'd enough of madmen already, thanks ever so. But this was his job: jollying along the foreign nutters on behalf of the Ministry. He felt it was truly a just compensation for his previous sins, no matter what the occasional Malfoy-hater might mutter in passing. And they _did_ mutter, damn it - still, even years later.

Screwbik was 6'7", and weighed in roughly the same amount of stone as a Welsh pony, per the stats in his profile; a very impressive width and height, even for an elderly Wizard. He was indeed of Prussian extraction on his father's side; solid Hereford English on his mother's, and the inventor of any number of incomprehensibly _avant garde_ yet extremely powerful Magical Items, many modelled after Muggle objects. Most of them had no purpose discernible, but a few - a miniscule few - had been adapted to the uses of the Ministry and the Cube was one of those latter. It served as a Magical Dampener, eating up any magic expended within a certain perimeter, and had thus proved very useful indeed to the ultra-secret cadre of Wizards and Witches who devoted their lives to behind-the-scenes 'situation control': the M13, as they were known in the back halls and break rooms of the wizarding government complex.

These 'super' secret M13 agents were responsible for preventing future Death Eaters and nascent evil overlords from bringing their nearly always clinically insane plans of world domination to fruition. The entire department worked in absolute discretion. No one knew just how many agents there were, nor their actual identities, excepting only the Minister of Magic, and that on a 'need to know' basis only. No one knew, either, what the M13 did or why at any given time, but the Minister seemed to rely on them heavily and Draco admitted to a grudging respect for the organisation.

If they kicked the arses of baby Voldies, Draco was all for them.

He'd done his own little jot of spying during the War, enough to get him off at the Trials with a slap on the wrist and a hefty fine, and it'd been no stroll through the park, that service. He couldn't imagine doing it for a living, day after day. The stress would do him in, surely.

No, no; give him simple diplomacy, a career ex-Slytherins were practically built for...of course, he'd entertained from time to time a perfectly understandable natural curiosity as to how an aspiring young Wizard (capable, competent - nay, superior! - and remarkably well-versed in a any number of Dark Arts but still firmly committed to the Good) might go about obtaining entrée into such an elite organisation as the M13. But that was merely idle curiosity on his part, Draco knew. He'd never seriously consider applying for a position that hinged on the trustworthiness of his prior rep - not and honestly believe he'd cut the mustard with the blokes that did the hiring. No, it was the good old F.O. for him, a steady but slow career track, and hopefully an ambassadorship of his own one day. Then he'd have the chance to prove his mettle - if anyone still cared by then.

Draco dragged himself back to the here-and-now with an inner start, closing the file with a snap. He calculated he'd have a little less than two minutes remaining of useful chair time after he'd fully absorbed the contents of the file; he'd not been nearly the tip-top of his year in Arithmancy at Hogwarts for nothing. Knowledge gained and in process of digestion, he polished off his tea with small graceful sips, crumbled his home-made biscuit politely, and then extended a casual hand for the brightly-hued Cube, intending to examine it more closely. It seemed rather as though it might twist about or perhaps come apart.

"_No_, son!" Weasley yelped, breaking the tiny silence that had fallen between them. Draco froze in place as the elder Weasley went on: "That's right - don't touch it! Strongly advise against touching it, the DOM does. Eats your magic right up, that thing. Use a handkerchief, at the very least - _do_."

Arthur Weasley sat back again, flapping his hands in a vague motion. He was frowning, a look that sat oddly on his jovial face.

"Er..." Draco drew his hand back abruptly, well aware that the time was ticking away and he'd only a minute, twenty seconds more before his seat exploded beneath him. "Marvellous. Um, then how shall I carry it...sir?"

"Oh, the M13's provided a special case for it. Here it is, dear boy." Jauntily, Mr. Weasley handed off a half-red, half-white ball composed of the same glossy material as the Cube, and hinged on the one side. "I wish you joy of it, m'boy - looks harmless enough, doesn't it?" At Draco's uncertain nod, Weasley carried on, grinning mischievously, for all the world as though he were being exceptionally clever. "That's actually a Muggle ball. They use for some sort of children's gaming activity, and one of our more perspicacious operatives has adapted it to safely contain the Cube. Can't have the ruddy thing leaking out its Dampening properties all over the landscape, now can we? End up as Squibs, all of us, right?"

"Squibs?" Draco rose abruptly to his feet, shoving his chair hard enough to send it nearly tipping over. "Sir, what do you mean exactly, 'end up as _Squibs_'?"

"Careful, there! Don't want to set that off before its ready, Draco," Weasley warned. "As to your question, the Cube eats magic, m'boy," Weasley grinned maniacally at this and Draco had to repress a shudder. "_All_ magic. Including yours, naturally, should you so much as simply lay a finger on it without proper safety gear. Hoovers it right up upon contact, so you don't want to be carrying it about without the case and you certainly don't wish to expend any magic anywhere near it. Like a siphon, the Cube is. Or a sponge cake. But not as tasty, of course."

"Naturally not, sir," Draco responded absentmindedly, busy doing some further absorption of his own. So many factoids presented; so little time to parse them. And Weasley was a weird old arse and quite possibly as nutters as the Screwbik fellow. "So, it _is_ quite dangerous, Mr. Weasley? As in," Draco went on, sidling sideways just the merest amount, "it's actually more of a secret weapon than a curiosity? And I'm not to use any magic near it, for fear I won't have any left, after?"

"Got it in one, m'boy!" The Head of MACARONI seemed quite jubilant at Draco's quick summation of the Cube's Dampening properties. "Young Hermione did put it about you were sharp on the uptake, Draco. Here, open that Ball up, now, if you please - and perhaps also...duck! Chair's about to go any moment now."

Draco hastily held out his new Muggle ball, pressing madly on the odd little black intaglio'd button on the one end that simply must pop it open and shut, as he couldn't discern any other latch or closure. He was fortunate; the ball did indeed spring agape and Arthur Weasley gingerly dropped the Cube into the matte black interior with a dull rattle, employing the sugar tongs once more. Abandoning them to the tea tray, the older man then thoughtfully scooped up the all-important dossier on Screwbik, before he, too, rapidly abandoned his seat at the conference table. Draco slammed the Muggle ball shut with a plastic snap and took a very long step backwards and away from conference table and his poor, unfortunate chair.

He waited, counting internally: T-minus ten seconds, as per his mental stopwatch.

At the five second mark, there was an ominous and extended dull rumble, which filled the room and caused Draco's ears to go all wonky. The doomed tea tray shook in place, clinking. Draco's cup spontaneously shattered.

"Might want to take cover, son," Weasley remarked casually when there was just two seconds left, peering out from behind a nearby filing cabinet like a gangly, ginger-maned grasshopper. "Messy things, chairs. All nails and spindles, you know."

**BOOM!**

"Thank you, sir," Draco replied dryly, from his highly undignified crouch behind a handy rolling trolley, fortunately piled high with yet more thick, cushioning files marked _'Danger'_ and (curiously enough) _'Drink Me!'_. He calmly brushed the lingering sawdust off his robes and pocketed the Muggle ball, clearing his throat. The room would require the services of a crack team of Ministry elves, stat, in order to be usable again for the next scheduled meeting. "Ahem. I've just now realised that."

0O0


	2. C'est, what?

HD The French Connection Chapter 2

0O0

Aesthetically, the French Muggles weren't doing so badly, Draco grudging admitted. The Gare Saint Lazare train station, a vaulting, echoing structure of wrought iron and glass panels, was no hardship on the naked eye.

St. Lazare, however, boasted shiny, bright-yellow, trunk-sized Muggle objects marked 'Compostez votre billet', which apparently required the rectangular parchment scrap Draco clutched. This had been pressed into his hand by the last of a long line of smiling but largely unhelpful Wizards and Witches from the Ministry's Overseas Postings Action Response Team (aka OPART; pronounced 'Op Art'). As Draco had been given to understand in a rapid gabble whilst he and his OPART reps raced through the Ministry's subterranean hallways, one had to feed the yellow machine these strips of paper before the train would allow one egress, or be served a hefty fine in Muggle currency.

Draco had previously concluded correctly that his parchment scrap - or billet - was to be vastly important to his immediate future and, further, that they were to be obtained at the cost of some unknown amount of Muggle money from kiosks populated with generally harried official-types and/or other boxes studded with buttons and glowing telly screens. Luckily, he was equipped for his start, but this information would be invaluable to the next steps in his mission. Likely, he'd be reduced to riding the train like any common Muggle and he very much doubted Muggle trains were anything like the Hogwarts Express.

The difficulty, as Draco perceived it, lay not in procuring the parchment scrap, but in how to entice the machine to willingly accept it, whilst also keeping track of one's belongings. He'd been provided a huge piece of wheeled Muggle luggage, which was actively hindering him, as he'd quite forgotten he wouldn't be allowed to Shrink it and carry it about with him in his robes pocket.

He'd no proper robes pocket available, for that matter. A Mugglewear jacket had been supplied to him, and also trousers, socks, shoes and so forth. These various vestments were hideous and made of several plebian sorts of materials Draco absolutely despised for their poor quality. His shirt, for instance, was a plain white cotton button-down and not too terribly awful, but the trousers - a rough blue-grey fabric and tattered at the cuffs - were too small and clung obscenely, outlining faithfully his arse and bits, and the tan corduroy jacket they were teamed with was confusing, with far too many pockets in all the wrong places and ugly patches of Black Watch plaid sewn on the elbows. Further, the 'jeans' (as the OPART rep confided his trousers were called by fashionable Muggles) were labelled prominently with the word 'Levi's', which Draco was forced to assume was the name of a Muggle tailor of exceeding ill repute, as no self-respecting craftsman would ever purvey to a Wizard such garb.

Oh, but how Draco yearned for his wand, so he could at least cast a resizing spell! His groin was practically sculpted in _bas relief_ by these horrid 'jeans', which left him feeling very much on display. Draco winced inwardly at the ridiculous picture he must make. Salazar save him if he ever came up with an unexpected stiffie - likely he'd be arrested!

Draco's wand was not in evidence, having been checked in at MACARONI HQ, and he had only Muggle money to use as a tool and weapon against the anticipated trials and travails of Muggle travel. He'd always adored France, truly he did; owned several sizeable properties there, but he'd never once attempted to get about without his wand at the ready and a fully-equipped Wizarding vehicle or basic Floo-and-Portkey. It was bound to be horrid, touring Muggle.

And thus far it was, as he was stalled ruminating before the yellow contraption from Hades.

As he stood there, assessing his situation, his shoulder was bumped in a terribly matey manner. Draco froze, appalled by the sheer rudeness of _some_ Muggles. He turned on his heel with a glacial sneer affixed to his patrician features and confronted the felonious scum who dared molest him with the Look. This involved elevating his not-quite-as-pointy-as-it-used-to-be chin a precise degree of loft and staring down his aquiline nose, nostrils flared and brows arched just so, producing an overall effect achieved only by two species: Malfoys and Bactrian camels. It positively emanated sizzling 'Get off me!' waves.

"?"

A curiously well-known face was peering up at him, unaffected. No - _leering_!

"?"

"What?" an irate Draco demanded - and then lost his page when he realised who it was. He switched instantly to befuddlement instead, sputtering. "_Po-_? Pot? _Potter_!"

Not Potter. Demonstrably _not_ Potter.

A mime - a bloody performance artist - returned Draco's slit-eyed glare, an all too familiar 'Z' emblazoned across his whiter-than-white powdered forehead, his tip-tilted grin a brilliant red slash exaggerating his (by nature silent but apparently quite urgent) intent to gain Draco's attention.

Lambent green eyes outlined with smoky kohl blinked very slowly at Draco, their steady regard oddly cat-like in that painted mask of a face. He, too, had angled _his_ chin - nicely firm and charmingly cleft - at an equally high cant, revealing a corded throat as fish-belly pale as his face and the huge ruff of starched black lace that encircled it. The rest of him was all harlequin-clad and scarlet-ribboned at wrist and ankle: black-and-white diamonds two inches square each, knit of some shiny, silky, thin material that clung like a second skin to the svelte, athletic body beneath.

Draco choked and gulped, eyebrows dancing as he fought for his dignity. The iconic face in question then swiftly tilted the other direction, parroting Draco's affronted posture as he struggled to assimilate this, the latest intrusion of arbitrary weirdness into his Muggle-afflicted life.

"Er...eh?" Draco croaked. "Excuse me?"

"?" the mime asked, or rather, he acted out the asking. He uttered not a single syllable, that being the way of his kind. "?"

"Of course not Potter," Draco mumbled to himself, frowning, well aware that conversing with oneself was the first sign of going mental. Perhaps the stress of Muggling was affecting him. After all, this morning he'd been a simple Very Junior Attaché, and now he was...he was something else. _A diplomatic courier_, Draco thought and then snorted. More like an errand boy, but whatever.

"!"

The performer turned a backwards somersault, and Draco was treated to a clear view of an exceptionally fit arse, albeit harlequin and foolish.

"Erm," he said.

Still, it was damnably eerie: a Potter-type here, in Muggle Paris. Not that this was actually Potter; no, not by any means. This was but a common-garden street performer tarted up in all the famous Golden Boy's trademark kit: scar, stupid spectacles, rumpled shock of black hair and so forth. But no, not actual Potter. Not at all. _This is a bloody travesty, that's what_, Draco concluded, his astonishment rapidly turning to temper.

_In fact_, he fumed, _it was a travesty of a travesty_! This was France, yes, and there were known to be mimes in France, just as there were known to be cockroaches scuttling 'round Muggle flats. In fact, Muggle Paris might very well be infested with mimes for all he knew, rather like a particularly virulent form of scabies, and they might all be prancing about aping famous personages. But he'd never before seen a Wizarding mime, much less a Potter one, as this person was so very clearly meant to be, nor even conceived of such a thing. _Perhaps Weasley is correct; the Muggles know more than they let on_, Draco mused. Damned Muggles!

But there it was - or _he_ was, in all his Pottery glory, this chap: a huge shock of black hair (a wig, naturally, Draco decided instantly, peering); intense green eyes (Muggle contact lenses, Draco knew); and that great 'effing scar (_Scarlet lipstick; how demeaning!_ Draco huffed, his strange sense of ill-usage growing by leaps and bounds) emblazoned all over the rapscallion's mouth and forehead. _It was outrageous! _Draco ranted, his fists clenching unconsciously. It was disgraceful! It was a bloody affront to all English Wizardom held dear!

And he wanted to punch it, or at least make it go away and stop bothering him. Even Draco, not the most strident of Potter-fanatics by any standard, was miffed on behalf of Wizarding Britain's resident Hero.

"Oi!" he burst out.

"!" the mime waggled his exaggerated eyebrows right back at Draco and performed a small caper. "!"

Draco winced, scowling, and glanced about him, hoping they weren't attracting attention. There was that diamond-covered arse again, flying past. "Oi!" he said again, hissing it - not easy with no 'esses' available.

"!"

"Here, piss off, man," Draco barked gruffly, and loomed, advising the abominably fit street artist in no uncertain terms (via waving his billet about in irritation and waggling his eyebrows) that he'd no time to waste on this...this scourge on his sensibilities! Whatever else was going on here (and he had his own suspicions), Draco was still in process of holding up a growing line of impatient French Muggles gathering momentarily by this yellow metal obstruction, and the resultant brouhaha was effectively preventing him from boarding his own train!

"?" the mime 'replied', and motioned at both the machine and the slip of flimsy paper the Muggle billet issuer had presented Draco in exchange for his Muggle Euros. "?"

"What?" Draco scowled. "No! Be off, won't you?"

"!" the mime responded, whilst acting out some complicated dance, involving both hands and the machine, which may've made perfect sense to a fellow performance artist but hadn't the slightest effect on Draco's cognizance. And then - _and then_ - he'd the ruddy gall to snatch Draco's billet and make off with it!

"Oi! Give it here, you twink!"

Draco, trapped with his unwieldy Gucci luggage, was severely hampered in his efforts to give chase as the dratted mime danced in circles 'round the yellow box. The crowd began to ever so quietly hiss, boo and murmur inchoately behind him and, when he risked a darting glance backwards, he was greeted with nasty glares and some descriptive language that went well beyond the usual 'Merde!' Obviously, the Muggles also had important and pending connections to make. Draco didn't blame them in the slightest, really.

"I _say_," Draco burst out, utterly checkmated by hideous circumstance, "return that forthwith, you scoundrel, or I'll hex - he... er! _Hit_ you!"

"?...!"

The mime, safely on the other side of the yellow box, quirked those huge black eyebrows of his skyward and acted out a rollicking belly laugh of rude proportion. A few of the impatiently waiting French people tittered and chuckled, enjoying the free show. Draco ground his molars, having recalled abruptly that he couldn't hex the recalcitrant git to shreds, even if he wanted to. He'd a Magical Dampener tucked into one of his too-many pockets and no wand up his sleeve for the grasping. In truth, he was helpless, magically. He'd no choice next but to tackle the Potter look-alike to the floor and grapple with him, wresting his billet by force from those evil white-gloved clutches.

"!..!..!" The Pottery prat was still laughing at him-and pointing.

Tensing his knees and giving up on the idea of maintaining his Ministry-issued Muggle couture unblemished, Draco prepared for attack. _Needs must_, as Mr. Weasley had confided the Muggles often said, when confronted with rough choices.

"Fine!" Draco retorted, his internal fuse having substantially shortened, "you asked for it, prat!"

"!"

The street artist, in the interval, had circled the odd shiny machine twice more, skipping, and was grinning like the barmy moron he was. With a grand flourish, he gestured to a slot on the front of the gaily yellow monstrosity that Draco hadn't noticed previously. The billet was waved impudently under Draco's beak and then shoved into the slot with cotton-gloved fingertips. Simultaneously, the white-faced Pottery-flavoured prick whipped a huge, gaudy, neon-pink tissue paper flower from behind his own ear - where Draco was positive it hadn't been visible previous! - and proceeded to tuck it jauntily into Draco's lapel.

"!" the performer smirked smugly, his painted-on smile a brilliant slash of scarlet. Draco could just make out real lips under the layer of false colour; they were firm and nicely delineated. Manly, even.

"You! _You_!" Draco, blinking furiously, was left literally gasping at the insult. His all-important piece of Muggle parchment was captive in the machine's mouth and the bloody mime was touching him! _Him_! He ripped the offensive flower from his jacket and tossed it away, growling.

"!..!..!"

The mime guffawed silently, pointing at Draco's horrified visage with one long finger, reeling back into silent heaves of merriment. The other hand was poised in front of the machine, waiting. Then he shrugged, rolling a smooth shoulder. "?...?"

"See _what_, Potter?"

Just like magic, the yellow Muggle device spat Draco's billet back out, unbesmirched except for the addition of the date and time. Draco was speechless. Such a simple thing and yet not one of the OPART twits had bothered to mention it!

"Is that all there is to it?" he exclaimed. "Well, I'll be a Blast-Ended Skrewt!"

"!"

"Wait! You've been _helping_ me?"

His grey eyes bugged out in patent disbelief, melting straightaway into actual shock, for the Potter-mime-person had his firm broad hand flat at the small of Draco's flinching back and was literally shoving him past the evil machine, along with his rolling mountain of Muggle luggage. Appeased, the crowd behind Draco murmured their approval and began to swarm past the yellow box after him, some rudely jostling him to one side in their hurry. One after another, they did exactly as the mime had: shoving the paper into the slot, waiting a very brief moment until it reappeared once more, date-stamped, and then pushing on through in triumph.

It wasn't magic; it was mechanics! _Muggle_ mechanics, the very type Arthur Weasley so admired.

"Ah!" Draco exclaimed, having mastered the secret, jumped sharply as he felt the hand - gloved, yes, but still hot-palmed and wide; a man's hand - caressing his bum cheeks. He flushed uncomfortably and felt an unwilling twitch in his groin. "Wait - what? What? Stop that, you perv!"

But the performer was also vanished into the milling crowd, and Draco was left holding his voucher - plus a timetable, with his train number vividly circled in red lipstick, so that there was absolutely no way he could possibly mistake it.

"Oh...er. Brill. Erm...thanks," he called out vaguely to the abruptly emptied immediate vicinity, just in case the mime was yet lurking. Nothing happened, except for a few puzzled glances sent in his direction from other travellers, so he took up the handle of his oversized luggage somewhat dispiritedly.

That had been...odd.

"Grabby little bastard," Draco muttered to himself, a faint feeling of disappointment rising up his throat as he trundled off in what he hoped was the proper direction, following the signage. He'd come to the conclusion he might as well talk to himself, as there was no one else around who'd understand him anywhere near as well he would. It was looking to be a lonely few days. "Still..."

The street performer had been very helpful, really, and he'd wanted to ask it more questions.

"Chatty git, but useful."

Nicely put together, too. Too late now, he thought sadly and then noticed again the departure time printed on his schedule.

"Well..."

Draco glanced at his Muggle Rolex wristwatch and then at the timetable again.

"Oh. Oh, _shite_!" he cried out, elegantly styled luggage tracking this way and that behind him as he bolted off for the proper platform at a very rapid clip. If he carried on dawdling stupid after some random street mime, he'd bloody well miss his connection to Casino!

0O0


	3. The Furry Menace

HD 'The French Connection' Part 3

0O0

We believe the first line of our friend's note refers to Trouville-sur-le-mer, which is adjacent to Deauxville. Please make that town your first destination and please be certain to be 'seen', once you arrive.  
Toodles! Arthur Weasley

0O0

He'd not realised the journey would be as lengthy as it was becoming. Two, nearly three hours was a long time to one used to instantaneous travel. He'd brought along a novel or two (Muggle, of course, as he wasn't allow to carry any Wizarding objects about his person, including his signet ring and his lucky dried Puffskein's foot) but it was all about an elderly man fishing, and then not really managing to land anything worthwhile. Draco found _it_ very _un_-worthwhile, even as allegory, and tossed it aside after some half-hour of tooth-grinding attempts to make decent headway. A similar thing happened with the obscenely long tale of a very large white whale and the poor (and moronically stoic) lunatic obsessed with it. If this was classic Muggle literature, no wonder they'd developed the telly! Next on his list of paltry entertainment was a glossy publication aimed primarily at wealthy male Muggles, which Mr. Weasley had handed to him just prior to his being shoved out into non-Wizarding London via the Leaky.

"Emergency rations, son," Mr. Weasley had muttered, his gaze darting from side-to-side in a very suspect manner, or so Draco believed, till he at last discerned that Mr. Weasley was attempting to be secretive. "For the train. Been a bit of a scramble pulling these together. Had to send someone out to Foyle's. In any event, some of these chaps in this publication are Wizarding models and I've advised there's decent articles about what's _au courant_ Muggle-wise, so here you are. A little light reading for your journey. Oh, and I've thrown in some additional volumes on basic Muggle life the Agency's recommended highly. I know you're conversant with the primers, but it's better safe than sorry, right?"

"Er, right, sir," Draco answered instantly, willing to be agreeable.

Mr. Weasley handed over a canvas tote bag, full-size, which Draco awkwardly added to his already overloaded arms. The bag was overflowing with books of all shapes and sizes, and a quick glimpse at the titles revealed that he was in for an intensive bout with Muggle culture. Draco, though willing, ready and able, had his own choices of such literature safely residing on his bedside table. Some of the Muggle porn wasn't so bad, actually.

"Sir, is there any possibility I might visit the Manor briefly before I depart?" he asked politely. "There's a few things there I could use - not magical, of course -"

"Oh, no, son; sorry!" Weasley replied instantly, shaking his greying head dolefully. "Can't have you contaminated by magic at this juncture. Already toting the Ball, aren't you? No, I'm afraid you'll just have to go 'as is', as the Muggles say. And here's your cabbie, then - right on schedule!" the elder man gabbled on cheerily, as a rather down-at-the-heels chequered vehicle pulled up to the curb with a screech of brakes and a deathly putrid cloud of petrol fumes. "It'll deliver you straight to Heathrow, Draco, and then you'll be escorted over on the Muggle aeroplane voyage by our boys and girls in OPART, so not to worry, son. We won't let you start off on the wrong foot - not a bit of it! Cheerio, then, and _do_ damage a femur, as they say in Muggle theatre!"

"Oh, but - I've a question still, sir. Precisely how many days d'you think this will require, exactly?"

"Bon voyage, as they say!" Mr. Weasley sang out, waving Draco's anxious query off like so many mayflies and then disappeared back into the bowels of the Ministry. A still gawping Malfoy was officially off on his first 'solo flight' as a Very Junior Attaché.

But he was not alone. Far from it. He was summarily relieved of his luggage and bundled into the rear seat by the chattering cabbie, who appeared to be a Wizard passing for a Muggle, as well as a sufferer of verbal diarrhea, and thus Draco never did gain a chance to ask the senior Weasley any further questions, nor protest his abrupt departure. Nor would he, till mission's end. Communications, he'd been advised, were severely limited to one-way telegrams from Director Weasley, issued only as needed, and Draco was to maintain a low profile, travelling discreetly through France in the guise of a well-to-do gentleman on a self-guided holiday tour of the various coastal wineries. He'd not even been provided a Muggle cell phone, which was, he huffed internally, the very least they could've done for him, given the peculiar circumstances. Even _he_ knew how to operate one of those!

The gentleman-of-leisure shtick was close enough to the truth so as allow him to act naturally, though, as long as he completely disregarded the fact that he'd none of his own familiar possessions about him, was utterly handicapped by the bloody Dampener doohickey, and was required to avoid all other Wizarding folk to the utmost of his ability, for fear of accidentally Dampening_ them_. Apparently, Draco Malfoy himself was considered highly expendable, Draco concluded huffily, as no one in OPART had seemed at all concerned for his safety or that he was charged with ferrying about a device that might - completely without warning - effectively turn him into a bloody Squib, at the accidental failure of a squiffy Muggle plastic hinge.

Likely they believed he deserved it, Draco ruminated somewhat pettily, his lips pinching tight at the very idea. There were far too many small-minded people in the world, at least as far as he was concerned; many of whom seemed only to recall his family's prior transgressions from the screaming headlines and consequently paid not the slightest amount of attention to the acquittals that followed or his own quiet but significant contributions to the plus side of the ledger of All That Was Light & Right, as epitomized by sodding Potter.

Settling into his surprisingly comfortable window seat, Draco caught up the magazine, determined to distract himself with what well-bred male Muggles were advised to be wearing in the coming summer months. At the very least, he allowed silently, he might be amused.

"Pardon, s'il vous plait," a man's voice pleaded. "Pardon, pardon."

Draco scooted his luggage farther out of the way without bothering to look up.

The seat cushions across the aisle from Draco 'whomped' softly and a very large gentleman settled into them, emitting a long, drawn out sigh, like air escaping a child's balloon. He clasped the studded leash of a hugely shaggy grey canine, which appeared vaguely Russian - a Borzoi or something like, Draco mused haphazardly, not being particularly conversant with Muggle dog breeds. The animal was squirming and tugging mightily at its bounds, obviously over-excited, and the well-fed man never ceased murmuring nonsense to it, attempting to soothe its starts and fidgets.

Draco, determinedly oblivious and pouting on principle (he did _not_ approve of dogs on trains), glared at the full colour image of the very handsome and scantily clothed man on the cover of the glossy publication Mr. Weasley had thrust upon him. The hazel-eyed youth, however, did not glare back, as the magazine was Muggle. It was, Draco gathered, paging through, organized along the lines of _Witch Weekly_ (which he himself never bothered with, of course, naturally, but did maintain an annual subscription to, purely for the sake of the house elves). It consisted of a great many artistically arranged colour adverts for men's garb and accessories, most bearing Italian, American or French brands, with just a smattering of a good, solid English names here and there, such as Burberry or the excellent and reliable old firm of Charles Tyrwhitt, a tailoring establishment even Draco favoured. The haute couture was generally arrayed and displayed by a whole series of fetching chaps (and occasionally, perhaps purely as a sly gag, by some large-breasted and equally fanciable female). The ads were static, though, unlike the Wizarding ones. A reader thus had to rely solely on his imagination to envision the swing of coattail on a sharp heel-turn or the fall of a draped sleeve when an arm was elevated. Or the tightening of fabric over arse, as faithfully outlined in fine-gauge wool or - or those damnable Muggle blue jeans!

Draco snorted softly, feeling vastly proud on behalf of the superior charms of the Wizarding fashion industry and its attendant drove of glossy publications, though he'd nothing to do with the making of them. He did, however, draw in his breath sharply over the highly suggestive pose of one dark-haired bloke, who was shirtless and almost wearing a pair of gravity-challenged Muggle 'jeans'. Perhaps, Draco admitted grudgingly, there was a rustic sort of appeal to those types of trousers. The model's navel and the revealed golden-bronze of his narrow hips was certainly refreshing. Bizarrely, the adjacent hellhound chose the very moment of Draco's tiny epiphany to emit a volley of barking, and Draco's deep concentration on the bloke's jeans was shattered.

Too, it was at that moment a female sashayed into Draco's train compartment: a middle-aged frou-frou type, even for a fashionable Frenchwoman, arrayed in the year's very latest mode of Chanel suiting (Draco was fairly sure he had his women's fashion collections sorted correctly, thanks to his mother) and bearing a large violet sack-bag with a wire panel attached to one end. The oversized purse mewed piteously. It bloody well caterwauled when the woman genteelly elbowed the dog-toting man aside, taking firm possession of the window seat left open next to him. The bag continued to yowl and snarl, unabated, even when the woman pleaded with it to cease fussing.

Unchecked, for it seemed the large man was also quite ineffectual in controlling his furry nearest-and-dearest, the giant hairy canine lashed himself up to a veritable maelstrom of gruff yipping, yelping and growling, and utter cacophony resulted, for the train compartment was only so spacious. Noises echoed, despite the nicely padded seats and plush carpeting. The surrounding passengers unhelpfully took up for their betting favourites in this classic confrontation of 'cat versus dog', and added to the noise pollution by variously hissing, gossiping and cheering, perhaps in sympathy or perhaps in empathy, Merlin only knew.

Draco, glancing about him somewhat anxiously and noting there were no empty seats left but the one directly next to him, winced and rapidly turned another page, subtly shifting closer to his own window. He attempted to seek some sort of refuge by fading into the shiny metallic finish of the train's wainscoting, but to no avail. He confirmed, though, the previously vague conviction that he most certainly did not approve of felines on trains, either, and vowed never to allow one to accompany him.

That aside, the yammer and bustle, meanwhile, had increased exponentially, as the stout man and the well-clad woman began exchanging heated words, each demanding that other placate their respective animals.

Draco huffed to himself in irritation and kept up his air of disinterest. But not for long, unfortunately.

"'Excuse me, M'sieur," the large man addressed a sullen Draco, leaning over the gap between the seats with red-faced effort. "I know this is a great favour to ask of you, but if I could trouble you to mind my little boy for a moment? My beloved Gerhard, he is in sore need of a tiny 'time-out' to calm him-so many thanks, young man! You are so kind!"

The man smiled genially, waggling his bushy eyebrows, but still wasted no time shoving the loop of the leash onto Draco's lap. Draco grabbed at it automatically. Taking a deep breath, which swelled up his already majestic avoirdupois to resemble blowfish proportions, the canine-fancier returned his full attention to the fashionable cat-woman, clenching his freed-up and meaty fingers into pugnacious fists and waving them about. A barrage of rapid colloquial French ensued immediately, from both parties, and spewed almost too fast for Draco to translate any of it.

"Oh!" Draco exclaimed, appalled, ably ducking a biff to the temple when the man gestured as large as his belly. No, his initial opinion hadn't budged. Canines and trains did _not_ go together!

The dog, perhaps sensing Draco's inner disapprobation, turn his massive head and snarled, slavering and fixing Draco with a vicious red-eyed glare and baring molars the size of a Horntail's. Draco, though no coward, shrank back in his seat.

"No!" he protested faintly, but the man and woman were going at it, hammer-and-tongs, and the language had abruptly descended to sewer-foul and was clearly not meant for public consumption. The volume had escalated, too, and they simply didn't seem to hear him, leaving Draco no choice but to politely turn away again, still in temporary possession of the hairy monster. And all the while the dog kept up its horrible growling and the woman's fluffy white feline, having artfully escaped its carrier, twined the tops of the row of seats, smirking, yowling and generally taunting her enemy at high volume. Several cat lovers in seats farther back in the car applauded its valour.

Draco sneered - and fretted. He was required to be inconspicuous and this situation was not helping matters!

"Please!" Draco tried once more to garner the attention of the arguing pet owners, and that was exactly when the possibly-a-Borzoi lost any tenuous grip it might've had on well-mannered canine behaviour. Draco nearly forfeited his seat altogether as the leash jolted sharply in his hands and the Borzoi lunged upwards and outwards, drooling insanely.

"Whoa! Whoa, I say!" Draco yelped and dropped his _GQ_ in consternation, instinctively resisting. The animal weighed more than he did, he was positive, and he briefly entertained horrid visions of being hauled ruthlessly away from his luggage, dragged down the narrow aisle face first, and carried right out the hissing pneumatic entry door to his death. But the two Muggles across from him didn't even spare him a second glance, being entirely occupied with their own hissing. In fact, it seemed like there were snakes on the train, there was suddenly so much overall sibilance. "Halt, sirrah!" Draco ordered grimly, red-faced and panting with the effort to stay put. "Hold up, you beast! _Merlin_! Heel, I say! Sit! Stay!"

The dog ceased its infernal gyrations only just long enough to glare at Draco, slit-eyed and actively frothing, in a way that said clearly, 'I'll deal with you later, human!' and then returned to plunging wildly after its ancient enemy. Draco, flailing about and practically falling over his armrest, finally thought to bring his loafer-clad feet up and brace them flat against the rear of the seat before him, wrapping both hands 'round the leash loop in a tight-jawed attempt to endure.

"Fuck it!" he muttered, snarling himself. "Shite! Bloody hound! Blasted bloody Muggles! Sir! _Sir_! You really _must_ take back your mutt! I insist!"

It was no use. The man couldn't possibly hear him over the high-pitched stream of gutter invective his companion was dishing out and the cursed cat wasn't helping matters at all, uttering ferocious snarls and eerie shrieks more suited to a public zoo than a public conveyance. The dog had taken to baying.

"Oh, no!" Draco groaned, as the heavy man's 'beloved Gerhard' propelled himself to yet new heights of unmanageability. His palms were sweaty; the leash was slipping, and at any moment the dog would escape his collar and murder them all! "Oh, no!"

"Oh, now," remarked a familiar deep voice, one that Draco barely noted as very recognisable in his mad frenzy of resistance. "That's _not_ what's wanted. Budge over, Malfoy," Harry Potter ordered, taking charge. "Give me that."

And he plucked the leather loop right out of Draco's hands and stared commandingly at the rabid excuse for a pedigreed canine.

"Sit!" Potter ordered firmly, but kindly, and the dog promptly sat.

"Hush!" Potter added, and the dog snapped its jaws shut, just like that.

"And _you_, as well, Mademoiselle," Potter went on, turning a gimlet green eye on the poufy-tailed cat. Which then meekly and sweetly ceased its eldritch screams and briskly sauntered back into its carrier, all the while purring buckets and pails and blinking ever-so-fondly at Potter.

"Thank Salazar!" Draco mumbled gratefully, shaking the ache out of his knuckles and examining the crisscrossed red lines burned into his palms. He shook his head, too, having developed a sudden piercing ache in the sinuses.

"Monsieur, Madame," Potter carried on, his baritone the literal Voice of Reason. "Pardon me, if you please. _Un moment._"

The other occupants of the train car instantly settled down, as it appeared the ruckus was ended.

Even the heavy man and the fashionable woman shut it abruptly, and Harry Potter, opening his lips and spouting a flow of perfect conversational French, proceeded to skillfully restore dog to owner and persuade both parties to stopper their gobs and settle their differences. _And_ be civil about it.

"Merlin!" Draco swore under his breath, and made a grab for his magazine, which was splayed out on the floor. "_Some_ people!"

Gathering himself together and not knowing what else to do, as Potter had magically appeared to save the day, Draco squinted carefully at the exceedingly small font of the magazine articles Mr. Weasley had mentioned. Finally, he capitulated with a long-suffering sigh and retrieved from a pocket the ugly Muggle reading glasses OPART had been kind enough to equip him with, back at the Ministry. In moments, he was (apparently) so totally absorbed in the task of assimilating Muggle men's wear (and by the large number of brunet models featured in this particular edition, quite a few of them hazel or green-eyed) that he didn't even take note when Potter ceased his long, amiable conversation with the French couple (who, as it turned out, were legally man-and-wife, and quite happily in the midst of their second honeymoon) and turned his shaggy head in Draco's direction. In fact, Draco was so very determined not to notice his companion, it was a ruddy physical shock to glance up and find sodding Potter, of all people, still plumped down square in the seat next to him, examining Draco as if he were a rare butterfly stuck on a bleeding pin.

He suffered a minor species of panic all over again, Draco did. Whatever could he say to Potter, when he'd always made it a point to avoid him?

The bloody _Man of the Hour_, as Draco liked to think of him, _Golden Boy_ being rather outdated at age twenty-five, uttered not a word, at first. His eyes travelled over Draco leisurely, from toe of loafer to part of pale hair by slow degree, and Draco goggled stolidly in return, unblinking, silently sorting over all he knew of Potter whilst he waited for the _ad hoc_ staring contest to end.

For it was not as though 'the Man' did much of anything special these days, as far as Draco could discern from the tabloids, but he was still relatively newsworthy. Still occupied with rampant do-gooding, too. Potter had given up Auroring some time ago, Draco knew, remerging from a brief hiatus as a minor philanthropist. Had even established his own private charity foundation, _Phoenix Rising_. Hermione Granger, as per Draco's recollection, managed it for Potter and it was all very orphan-centric and laudable. _Potter_ was laudable, really. A man to be admired - from a safe distance.

A very safe distance - Draco was toting along a Magical Dampener. Not a good show, Dampening the Boy Who Lived. Mr. Weasley would _not_ be amused.

Well, Draco decided, if the distance between them couldn't be physical, it could certainly be mental. Before _he_ went bloody mental, being exposed to a real live Potter unexpectedly.

But still, he couldn't just sit and stare. He must attempt to be pleasant, Draco knew. It was required of him.

"Hullo, Potter."

Draco nodded politely after another immensely long pause, and then studiously returned his gaze to his article on suspenders, use of. Or rather, he forced his eyes in the direction of the nicely muscled models wearing them and valiantly kept his lips zipped, terrified of encouraging the slightest possibility of idle chatter. Perhaps Potter would depart to whence he came, if Draco wasn't effusive...or responsive.

"Hullo, Malfoy. Nice to see you."

Potter, abruptly ending his regard, promptly opened a dog-eared paperback novel he pulled from a torn pocket and buried his nose in it. His ugly spectacles slid down his not-ugly nose in a very attractive manner.

Draco swallowed.

"Of course. Likewise, Potter," he mumbled.

After another long moment, Draco huffed irritably, making sure to be very quiet about it. Wouldn't do him any good to offend Potter now. Or later. Or ever. Even if he wasn't much in Potter's circle socially, he still had to contend with the Prat-of-Prats every now and then and it paid to remain civil. Especially when one was wholly committed to a career of diplomatic service.

Potter also sighed after a while, nearly inaudibly, and pulled out a bottle of Perrier water from a rucksack he carried. He took a brief swig, capped it neatly, stowed it and returned to his novel without ever glancing over at Draco. Draco, watching his actions surreptitiously from the corner of his eye, noticed Potter's throat moving and thought instantly of the white-necked, make-upped mime who'd aided him at the start, clad all in jaunty monochrome diamonds, with that silly, poncey ruff of black lace clasped round his Adam's apple. Here beside him was the 'real deal', as the Muggles said, and Draco couldn't even begin to imagine this scruffy Potter sporting either a lace collar or harlequin suiting that revealed every line and curve of his toned body. A leather collar, perhaps, and much tighter garb than what he presently clad in, but certainly not lace.

Potter, Draco mused, would be silly in Chantilly, the blighter. Or Lycra, which was, he believed, what the Muggles used for sewing that clingy, skin-tight circus attire. No sense of style, the wanker. Even now he was garbed in paint-spattered Muggle blue 'jeans', rolled up at the ankle, some sort of battered black canvas duck lace-up footwear and a huge misshapen burgundy woolen jersey, appliquéd with a bloody golden-embroidered lion's head and far too many sequins for a mane. It was a laughable outfit, in Draco's opinion, especially when combined with that hair and those stupid black-rimmed spectacles Potter had seemingly never bothered to change out since their Hogwarts days. It was highly unsuitable for travelling in France, where even leisure clothing was fashionable.

Draco wondered vaguely if Potter was under the impression that the get-up he was wearing rendered him less attractive to stray fortune hunters. Perhaps that was why he insisted on being ruddy rudely attired, because _he'd_ heard tell Potter was quite well off, having inherited two fortunes. Even he, Draco, suffered from hangers-on questing after his own legendary store of Galleons, despite the lingering miasma of ex-Death-Eater scum that clung to him, no matter what he did to dispel it.

Potter, come to think of it, had made a wireless speech about just that topic, recently. Concerning the need for his fellow Wizards and Witches to treat 'other' people fairly, and featuring him stating repeatedly that his listening audience must provide each other a fair chance in life. Exhorting them all not to assume that certain 'other people' were evil or ill intentioned simply because their ideologies differed. And stating, as well, that the Wizarding community should be content to 'live and let live' in these days post-Voldemort. Draco had applauded the speech internally, and toasted Potter's remarkable fluency in getting across what Draco believed an admirable concept, if unrealistic. He'd stayed by the Wizarding Wireless broadcast for hours that evening, listening to Potter's sexy voice repeating those key words over and over, every instance they replayed the clip: 'Live and let live.' He supposed that also applied to him, in Potter's estimation.

Whatever. He wasn't about to debate the likelihood of that scenario ever happening; Draco had simply relished hearing Potter say it aloud. More than made up for his execrable day wasted squiring about the spoilt wife of the Brazilian Ambassador, who'd really needed a bellhop or a house elf far more than she'd ever been in need of his services, as official diplomatic escort.

Draco was still so pleased with Potter, even months on, he ventured another few words in his general direction when the train finally pulled into Trouville station.

"Good day, Potter."

Potter, already up and pacing down the aisle after the man, his wife and their now well-behaved animals, glanced back over his shoulder. To Draco's consternation, he grinned cheerily, sending Draco a sly wink. That made a mockery of the mime's travesty, in Draco's opinion. This was the _genuine_ Potter. He knew; he'd seen it often enough, back at Hogwarts. From a distance.

"Same to you, Malfoy."

Draco's opinion was also that Potter was rather fanciable when he cared to smile, straight at one's face. As he had, just, with Draco.

The train station at Trouville was a half-timbered, Tudoresque building, sprawling and complex. When he stepped off the train and achieved the reception area proper, Draco shivered. It was March yet and there was a distinct smell of the sea in the chilly air. The train journey, the last hour of which had seemed to drag on forever and a day with Potter beside him, seemed suddenly beckoning. It'd been warm and somehow comforting to have Potter barely an inch away, silently immersed in his Muggle pulp fiction, despite the never-ending tingles of heady excitement Draco had had to contend with.

He rather regretted not offering up much in the way of conversation after that initial greeting, but, after all, it wasn't as if they had much to converse about, he and the Hero. Draco kept himself to himself these days, beavering capably away at his post (which was indeed difficult, as it meant he had to belt up on his temper), and rarely venturing out with the Ministry types to their after-work drinks parties and Friday night club fests. Potter, having two best mates involved with the Ministry, all too often turned up for those events, so Draco made a habit of avoiding them. He seldom attended the organised fêtes and soirées the wealthier families hosted, either, and limited bestowing his elegant presence in person to the diplomatic functions he felt obligated to attend in his position as Junior Attaché. Potter never went to those dos if he could help it, saving his air kisses and meaningless handshakes for charity balls and the like. Which all resulted, in the end, in Draco hardly ever running into Potter socially, and that was the way he much preferred it.

It wasn't as though he was concerned they'd quarrel, or that he still held Potter in dislike. It was more that he chose not to waste his time brooding over a man he was never going to have. Potter, simply by circumstance, was not a blip on Draco's radar, nor would he ever be, realistically, and there was no point in dwelling.

But, still. It had been rather cozy, sitting next to Potter. Sharing the same oxygen, exchanging the occasional glance when the large man cooed at his evil dog or the fussy woman fed her cat scraps of cake through the holes in the carrier. By the end of the trip, the two of them had been getting along like houses afire; the doggy man and the feline woman, naturally, not Draco and Harry.

Draco shivered again and took a good look about him, a faint concern growing in his gut. The afternoon was wending down to dusk and he was in need of a place to sleep. The enormous bulk of the Casino was more than visible in the not too far distance but he wasn't certain it was open off-season for tourists sating over. Certainly, there were no French playboy types frolicking merrily nearby, as his travel guide had stated the town was noted for. Didn't look much like the high life was happening here; not at all, and Draco had no clue why Screwbik the Inscrutable would want him here, of all places.

"M'sieur? M'sieur?"

An elderly man was addressing him, his quavering voice growing more insistent with each repetition.

"Might you be in need of a taxi?" he asked the startled Draco, in accented English.

"Oui, oui, s'il vous plaît," Draco replied hastily and gratefully, in the hopes the cabby could deliver him to a viable hotel. If nothing else, he needed to explore his Muggle luggage, which seemed to have taken on a life of its own, and see what else OPART had packed for him. Hopefully, there were PJs tucked in there somewhere, a toothbrush and also a Muggle razor, as he could feel the faint growth of invisible stubble when he rubbed a weary palm across his chin.

A pox of this accursed pseudo-Muggleness of his! Draco fumed, as he rode in the ancient excuse for a taxi, clutching wildly at the strap at every hair-raising turn. If only he'd his wand - or even if he'd _any_ of his usual accoutrements, he wouldn't be left feeling so damned helpless! Now he required not only a room, but likely also a map and a tour guide, having never visited this part of France. Then, too, and likely obnoxiously bright and early on the morrow, he'd be required to venture out to be 'seen' by some mad Prussian inventor. Most infuriating, the unreasonable demands made by the F.O. and the most senior Weasley, but he couldn't complain, now could he? It was still the least he could do to maintain international Wizarding relations. Even if he wasn't in the same class as that prat Potter, who supported orphans and saved the world in his spare time, Draco could do his bit.

And bloody Potter had long since disappeared into thin air once they'd disembarked. Draco was certain he wouldn't be seeing him again, not even by accident. Not a bleeding chance.

Fate couldn't be that cruel...could it?

0O0


	4. Devious Grapes

HD The French Connection Part 4

0O0

**To:** Minister Kingsley Shacklebolt  
**Status:** For Your Eyes Only  
**Dossier Document (Shred or Incendio after)**  
Mr. Potter, after some heated discussion with other agents of the M13, has nominated Junior Attaché Draco Lucien Malfoy as a possible candidate for a posting within the M13. Mr. Potter cites that Malfoy is an extremely powerful Wizard, likely second only to Mr. Potter's level of overall magical ability, is well versed in the methods of Wizards/Witches employing the Dark Arts, is unfailingly loyal to England, is a quick study and possesses a built-in cover, as a wealthy diplomat in the making. Mr. Potter has stated he trusts Mr. Malfoy with his life. He has, to this end, established a test of sorts of Mr. Malfoy's mettle, with an eye to recruiting him, and will be reporting on the results at conclusion. He had mentioned he appreciates the Ministry's cooperation in this endeavour.

0O0

The following morning, Draco emerged from the Château des Fougères, the well-appointed hotel he'd rather fortunately fetched up in the previous night, courtesy of the kindness of the taxi man, and faced his first real day as a Muggle tourist with a long-suffering sigh.

It was dismal, to be sure. He'd a lot of ground to cover, but fortunately Henri, the taxi man, had agreed to ferry him about so that he could see and be seen. The Casino Barrière de Trouville was first on his list, an immense structure of dressed stone, followed by the Musée des Beaux-Arts André Malraux. He'd finish up by strolling the quays and markets of the picturesque seaside town and then hopefully hire Henri to drive him wherever else Mr. Weasley planned to send him. He winced, anticipating a sore arse in the offing. Henri was so proud of his rattletrap Muggle cab, Draco hadn't the heart to protest

0O0

La Palmyre Zoo is your next stop, Draco. Make certain to 'cavort'; Screwbik seems to require it. Discreetly, of course. We don't want to have to send in the Obliviators. Remember, 'damage a femur', as the Muggles say! Best regards, Arthur Weasley.

0O0

At four o'clock p.m., precisely, Draco was packed up once again and ready to depart for the next leg of his journey. He'd had been alerted by Muggle telegraph upon his return from an awkwardly casual stroll about Trouville's semi-deserted open-air market (it being March, dusk, and quite chilly). The Dampener rattled ominously in his pocket, where it'd been residing all day, frightening the living daylights out of him. Henri was standing by, as he had been bribed into joyous miniondom by copious amounts of Ministry Euros, when a very flashy vermillion Muggle auto pulled up in front of the hotel with a scream of fancy tires.

"Potter!" Draco exclaimed, and then fastened his eyes lasciviously on the Muggle vehicle, which boasted the powerful lines of a thoroughbred stallion and was visibly throbbing, making the most exciting 'Va-Va-_Vroom_!' noises. "Whatever brings _you_ here?"

"Want a ride, Malfoy?" Potter asked, levering himself from his screaming scarlet sex machine on wheels. He was in yet another hideous student-type outfit and looked more as though he should be sprawled out in the lobby of a youth hostel than lounging elegantly before the imposing façade of one of the finer hotels in Trouville. "Going south, by any chance? _I_ am. Glad to drag your arse along with, if it suits."

Draco, though wary, was captivated. Not by Potter, of course, but by the Muggle racecar.

"What _is_ that?" he demanded, his grey eyes sparkling, a hand already feeling up a silky-smooth quarter-panel. "Can I have a turn steering? Just a quickie?"

"Ferrari Testarossa, Malfoy," Potter smirked, folding his arms and leaning back against the shiny blood-red hued hatch door of the coupe. "And no, I don't think so. I'd prefer to live, actually."

"Er?" Draco turned to Henri, who was also openly salivating over the Ferrari. "Um, Henri. If you don't mind, I'm to ride with my - my friend here. Keep all the Mug... erm, _Euros_, of course, for your trouble," he added quickly, feeling the veriest rudesby. After all, without Henri, he'd still be at the station, perplexed as to how Muggles moved themselves about with no magic and no carriages available at a simple wave of a wand.

Henri smiled bravely, though he seemed a tad downcast. Draco immediately dug out his purse - or rather, leather _billfold_, as the Muggles called them. His was stamped Gucci and packed full of those parchment scraps the Muggles seemed to use for everything. He dragged out yet another wad and pressed them upon the eager hands of the taxi driver.

"I am so sorry," he apologised, "I know its last moment, but I had no idea he'd turn up, so…"

"Come_ on_, Malfoy," Potter interrupted impatiently. "You've just handed him the equivalent of four hundred Galleons; he'll recover nicely, I'm sure. Hop in, will you? We've a long drive before us."

"Wait!" Draco, his hand on the Ferrari's door latch, hesitated. "How do you know where I'm going, Potter?" he demanded, eyes narrowed. "That's very...odd. Suspicious, even. Are you...are you by any chance _following_ me?"

"This," Potter replied, waving a familiar yellow slip of paper in the air: Weasley's telegram. Draco blanched. Had his mission been discovered? "You should dispose of your correspondence properly; _anyone_ could've read it. I also happened to be staying here, Malfoy. Saw you drop it, and was going to return it to you, like a polite little Gryffindor, when I noticed you were off to the Zoo. La Palmyra's near Royan, which happens to be where I'm headed."

"Oh," Draco sighed. "Well...in that case. If you insist."

"You should; I believe you've just blown your budget, paying off the cabbie. I'll treat you to supper, then, on the way," Potter offered, and Draco's eyes snapped up to stare at his mobile mouth. It wasn't sneering or even mockingly tilted, no; it was more... teasing, that particular smile on Potter's lips, Draco mused. He found he liked this new look of Potter's...teasing him. Without malice.

"Right, then."

The journey was longish, but time flew. Funny how that worked out.

"Are you in France for pleasure or business, Malfoy?" Potter asked him, once they'd settled into a steady pace. Rolling countryside flew by the windows, the lights of distant villages coming alive as the early spring twilight descended. Draco ostensibly admired the sunset - and Potter, when Potter's gaze was steady on the road before them and not trained on him.

"A bit of both, actually," Draco hedged, not looking Potter's way at all when he answered. Hard to look at Potter directly when he was fibbing. "We've estates here and we're always looking to acquire more properties. Wineries, in particular. So, you see..." he allowed his voice to trail off, hoping Potter would assume.

"Ah," Potter exclaimed, obligingly. He nodded. "And you're being discreet as to your purchasing inquiries? That would explain the Muggle train, I suppose."

"Yes!" Draco leapt to concur, as he certainly couldn't tell Potter about the Dampener ticking away in his pocket. "That's exactly it, Potter. Best not to let the Muggles know we're interested in acquiring their vineyards. They might be deviously plotting."

"Devious, eh? Over grapes?" Potter raised a brow and tilted that nice firm chin of his. "I don't know about that, Malfoy; vitriculture has never struck me as a livelihood that requires corporate intrigue, but, hey. Whatever."

"Exactly, Potter," Draco replied, and attempted to appear very canny about negotiating real estate bargains with plotting Muggles. "What do you prefer: red or white?"

"Oi, Malfoy! Just as a matter of interest, were you acquainted with that couple on the Trouville train?" Potter asked curiously, after they'd finished discussing their favourite vintages. "It was kind of you to help them out like that. Fucking enormous dog, that one. I think it was a Borzoi."

"Oh...no," Draco replied, and recalled the contretemps with a shudder. "No, I don't know them. Not at all. Thank Merlin."

It was a relief to swear like a real Wizard. He'd had to be terribly cautious about his careless language for fear of being outed. Muggles sent him odd looks whenever he mentioned Merlin or swore to Salazar, and he'd already garnered enough unwanted notice dealing with his evil luggage, the yellow box in St. Lazare and various revolving doorways. The seatbelts on the aeroplane had almost defeated him ignominiously at the start. Draco had yet to operate an ATM, which was the device Muggles used to print out their paper money, as per the Ministry's Muggle Travel guidelines he'd skimmed through somewhat hurriedly, but he wasn't anticipating _that _with any great joy.

"And I thought that, too, Potter - about the dog. Definitely something foreign and Muggle; so hugely hairy." Draco smiled, settling into his cushy leather seat. "Do you know Muggle dog breeds, Potter?" he asked idly, by way of keeping their desultory conversation going. "I only know the animals Wizards keep."

"Some," Potter allowed. "Watched Westminster once on the telly. I know more about autos, though."

"Tell me about this one, then," Draco demanded, patting the high-tech console affectionately. "It's lovely. Faster than my winged horse Calvin, certainly."

"Calvin?" Potter chuckled, and Draco allowed himself another small grin. The story behind the christening of Calvin was fascinating, if he did say so himself, and he proceeded to relate it, much to Potter's amusement. And then there was Hobbes, his rescued winged donkey, the reluctant star of another amusing tale or three. Their remarks shifted to the whimsical, and Draco was delighted to discover Potter could be droll when he wished to.

An intimate late supper - at a tiny restaurant in a nameless French village - brought them new topics of conversation.

"What _have_ you been up to lately, Potter?" Draco inquired, his tongue loosened by two glasses of an excellent vintage. He picked at the very last remains of his scallops au Provençale and gazed at Potter bright-eyed, defences rendered nearly non-existent by prolonged exposure to a charming Potter. "It's been ages since we've spoken casually. I must admit, I'm curious."

"This and that," Potter quirked his lips fleetingly and flourished his glass, his eyes a steady dark green. "I stay busy. But a proper toast, Malfoy. Appears to be called for, don't you think? We've not murdered one another outright yet, despite not agreeing on any number of things. I'm rather pleased, honestly."

Draco raised his own glass sharply, scowling ferociously. "Of course not, Potter. I'd not harm _you_, prat." He resented the very implication. He'd done nothing - but nothing! - to provoke that kind of remark from Potter!

"Really?" Potter twinkled. "And why _is_ that? I've been under the strong impression you didn't much care for me, Malfoy. You always go well out of your way to _not_ be where I am."

"That's only - I mean - you're not likely to -" _Want me around, are you?_ Draco barely stopped himself from blurting out that damning question, cursing the insidious wine and the flickering romantical candlelight all the while. Cursed ambiance! He'd nearly let his tongue run away from him, sod it, and he mustn't. Really, he _mustn't_. He was dangerous to Potter at the moment and he couldn't very well simply shrug off the salient fact he carried with him the Dampener. The ginger lot would never forgive him if he damaged their Boy; hordes of demented Weasleys would hunt him down and skin him raw in the blink of an eye.

"We can surely manage to get along now, Potter," he went on reprovingly, his stomach queasy at the thought of being hounded by giant carrot-haired gorillas, attacking right and left, for the remainder of his days. And, by Salazar, there had to be scads of them. He spared a half-sec to wondering where the French legions might be lurking. No doubt in Nord-Pas-de-Calais or perhaps even Languedoc, two lovely areas favoured by Wizard folk but not particularly well-to-do otherwise, judging by the more rustic state of the Muggles dwelling there. "We are adults, are we not?" he added smarmily, recovering his usual cool composure. "At least , I know _I_ am."

"Mostly," Potter allowed, quirking a sardonic brow. "Though I try not to be, really. Had quite enough of that, before."

"I see," Draco replied shortly, lips thin. "Some of us take life seriously, Potter. Some of us need to."

"Some of us really just need to enjoy life as it comes, Malfoy," Potter answered easily, "and, from the look of your forehead right now, that would include you. Relax, mate. You're on holiday."

"...Right," Draco acknowledged. He was, most decidedly, _not_ on holiday. "Working hols, for me. Shouldn't we be getting on with it, then?" he prompted, voice clipped and cool once more. "A long way to go yet and I'm anxious to meet with my latest vintner. Don't want to miss a single opportunity."

"You mean, to plot nefariously over grapes?" Harry grinned. "How devious, Draco."

"That's what I am, Potter. Don't forget that," Draco shot back repressively, and returned his full and undivided attention to his dinner.

Potter watched him curiously after that, but thankfully said nothing of import as he paid up the tab, and Draco climbed warily back into the sex machine and kept himself firmly to boring, deadly dull, non-incendiary topics for the rest of the drive.

"Have you noticed the weather, Potter," he found himself blathering, "has been warmer than is seasonable?" and then nearly stabbed himself through the eye when it struck him that he was trapped inside a very sexy Muggle vehicle with a very fit Harry Potter and reduced to remarking inanely on how pleasantly balmy it was for March. But that was still better than letting slip any of the other questions he'd knocking at the back of his front teeth, just dying to escape.

Les Mathes in the Charente Maritime district was their general destination, or at least Draco's. La Palmyre Zoo was quite close and no doubt there'd be Muggle taxis for hire. Potter was agreeable enough to stop the night nearby, in Royan, and even offered Draco the use of the second bed in his bespoke hotel suite, when they arrived far too late in the evening for Draco to book a room of his own.

"Thank you, Potter," Draco said grudgingly, accepting out of sheer necessity. Whilst they'd been at dinner, he'd briefly toyed with the intriguing possibility of offering Potter a quick kiss goodnight (it had rather felt as though they were a couple, out on a dinner date, earlier) but that stillborn scheme was effectively dead in the water. Not only had the atmosphere stiffened, but he'd be stranded, with no place to wank in private after, had he dared press his lips to Potter's smooth pink ones.

Of course, there was also the bloody Dampener. Draco was very much aware of its rectangular malignance, lurking in its red-and-white plastic Muggle container in his jacket pocket. That article was buried in the very bottom of his vile luggage, where hopefully it would be secure. Draco hadn't forgotten for a second it was hellaciously dangerous to regular Wizarding folk, Screwbik's blasted Cube, which was exactly why it was _him_ sent alone on this stupid jaunt about the Frankish countryside in the first place, and now he'd gone and stuck Potter squarely in the path of possible disaster, through no bloody fault of his own. Well...mostly 'no bloody fault'; he hadn't been forced to accept the ride to La Palmyre. He'd just really wanted to take advantage of the rare chance to talk to Potter without interference.

But Potter (who was, undeniably, the most powerful Wizard on the planet, even if he chose not to go about flaunting it) was not someone Draco ever wanted to harm. Not at all, and not merely due to a silly life-debt or blind gratitude or any personal reason (such as his own insidious sexual attraction to highly-charged Wizards; brunet, hazel-eyed Wizards, preferably with rakish scars and unhappy childhoods - a life-long fascination which had led to some rather unfortunate relationships, all of which Draco would much prefer to forget ever happened). No, it was the fact it was _Potter_.

Potter, who'd been gypped out of his first eleven years of his native magic, as Draco had learnt from _Witch Weekly's_ recent exposé; Potter, who'd been repressed, suppressed and oppressed by those horrid Dursleys, according to the heart-wrenching, bleeding-heart, sob-story reporting of Skeeter, and who'd been so very visibly awed by his first real experiences with magic, he'd gawped like a fool. Draco clearly recalled scoffing way back when, thinking what a silly baby that Potter boy was, really, but then he remembered just as vividly those green eyes opened wide with wonder when Potter first took off on his beat-up old Hogwarts regulation broomstick. His pesky eidetic recall when it came to all things Potter wouldn't let him forget the train compartment gleefully stuffed with grinning boys, Frog wrappers and Wizard cards, either - or the delighted smile on Potter's face when he first caught sight of Hogwarts castle proper. He'd not realised then what being magical meant to Potter, but he knew it now. Even the sloppy reporting of Skeeter couldn't disguise the fact that Potter loved his magic - or that he'd be utterly heartbroken without it.

No, Draco couldn't endanger Potter. That was absolutely the last thing he could ever do.

And, as he'd not consent to that, even if it meant giving up his one tiny happenstance chance to indulge in Potter's company in a non-hostile environment, far away from the memories of all that was between them back in bloody old England, then he'd have to go. Take himself right out of the picture. Immediately - or as soon as humanly possible, which effectively meant first thing the next morning, straight after breakfast. Which meant, too, that any snogging - even friendly, 'I'd not mind getting to know you better; thanks for a lovely dinner' sort of snogging - was completely out of the question.

"Shite," Draco muttered, and meant that, too. He rolled over, fretfully cursing variously Screwbik, Arthur Weasley and his own bloody bad luck, in a long, inaudible grumble.

"Mmnphf," Potter grunted, messing about with his coverlet. Draco could hear every shift of fabric in the dark.

"Shite, shite, shite." He was so very needing a wank and the cause of that was just a few feet away, clad only a skimpy t-shirt and faded boxers. It was horrible.

"Malfoy?" Potter's question was sleepy. Draco could discern Potter's every breath and slight sigh, and his thighs went rigid, tautly clamping down on his overeager prick. Salazar, but this was pure, unadulterated torture; payback in spades for every little dig he'd ever spat out in anger. Potter would probably be pleased...if he ever realised sodding karma was on _his_ side.

"Draco? Everything alright?"

"Yes," Draco groaned, restlessly rolling the other way and attempting to bury his bloody inconvenient boner into the harshly unforgiving springy mattress. "Spiffing, thank you, Potter. Good night now."

"Mmm. 'Night, Draco."

_Shite_. Draco's eyes popped open at the 'Draco'. He clenched them tight-shut again and bit back a moan. Salazar! Sodding little git, tormenting him this way! It wasn't fucking fair! Perhaps he could simply wait till Potter was asleep and pull off a quick one in the lav?

In the next bed over, Harry Potter's breathing finally slowed and he let out a dainty little snore. Draco's fingernails nearly punctured his sheets.

_Shite, shite, shite_. This was fucking _brutal_, this bloody 'thing' he had for Potter.

0O0


	5. A Sour Taste

HD 'The French Connection' Part 5

0O0

France in March was perhaps not quite as chilly and miserable as England in March, but it was damned close. The morning dawned grey and cheerless, damp and cool, providing a most suitable backdrop for Draco's dreary mood.

"Hullo, Potter," he greeted, wiping his lips carefully. His toasted croissant, spread thickly with sweet creamery butter and damson plum conserve, sat on the plate before him, reeking of flaky deliciousness. Hopefully, if he could manage to choke it down his dry throat, it would provide fuel for the upcoming, uncomfortable parting of ways and his required cavorting. He'd have to be polite to Potter, naturally, being a diplomat-in-training, but he could still push some of Potter's buttons in passing and that should suffice to send Boy Wonder off in a huff. It'd serve both to appease his squeaky-wheeled 'Good Samaritan Malfoy' instincts _and_ that tiny little demon snarling within him, who craved some small revenge for a night of unparalleled sexual frustration.

"Hullo?"

Potter had at last run Draco to ground in the café across the square from the hotel, where he'd taken refuge whilst Potter was showering. Draco had great reserves of self-control, but even he couldn't stand to be in the same hotel suite with a Potter who was showering. Had taken him ten minutes to staunch the nosebleed, as it was.

"You're up at the crack of dawn, Draco," Potter remarked casually, tentatively resting a tanned hand on the back of the extra chair at Draco's microscopic table. He hovered, as if he might sit down uninvited. "Something going on I should know about?"

"It seems I must thank you yet again, for your hideously Gryffindor charity," Draco jumped right into his scheme to fend off the Hero, both feet forward. "Potter. But I've an appointment in La Palmyre I mustn't miss, and I've made my own arrangements to travel there. Terribly sorry I was in such a confounded rush to depart that horrid excuse for accommodation you hired," he hurried on, "but my meeting's scheduled for nine o'clock sharp and it was imperative I move on." Draco maintained his level tone, but the look he gave Potter was faintly mocking. "And not dawdle about, wasting yet more time. Time is, after all, Galleons." Even a dolt like Potter couldn't possibly miss the insulting implications, could he? "Speaking of," Draco prepared the coup de grâce to his dying-on-the-vine relationship surgically, gaze resting grim on his tiny cup of espresso, "may I reimburse you the costs of your beneficence? The petrol? And the use of your spare bed, naturally. Wouldn't want to strain your resources in any way."

He sneered lightly in Potter's direction, though he carefully avoided meeting Potter's widening green eyes; an effort that cost him a great deal, but was worth it, considering the Dampener.

"Prick," Potter replied, succinctly. The chair scraped harshly across the tile as he shoved it neatly snug up against the wobbly table, having gotten his fine arse nowhere near it. He huffed and Draco winced. "No, don't bother yourself, Malfoy. Just glad to see the last of you. Have a blast chatting up your vintner. See you 'round."

And with that, Potter turned sharply on his heel and departed, without a single glance behind him. Not overly chatty, Potter, Draco observed. He didn't care to waste his precious time over fools, either.

Draco transferred his customary sneer to his hapless luggage, looming leathery at his elbow. Then to his poor, blameless croissant, which he'd not consumed very much of, though it was shredded as though he had. And finally his own serviette-draped lap, because it would be all that much more difficult for any curious passers-by to see that he was blinking furiously at his Muggle-style belt buckle.

0O0

**To:** Minister Kingsley Shacklebolt  
**Status:** For Your Eyes Only  
**Dossier Document (Shred or Incendio after)**  
Mr. Malfoy, age 24, approximately 5'10'', very pale blonde, light complected with grey eyes, and of English extraction despite the deceiving surname, also graduated with Honours from Hogwarts School for Wizards, ranking third in his class after Potter, Harry and Granger, Hermione. Mr. Malfoy functioned to provide some limited but crucial assistance in the war effort and did maintain Mr. Potter's cover under duress during a forced confrontation with Voldemort's agents. Mr. Malfoy owes Mr. Potter a life debt; Mr. Potter owes Narcissa Malfoy a life-debt. Mr. Malfoy is not normally to be seen in Mr. Potter's company socially, preferring to stay focused on his chosen career of diplomacy, but is observed to be both civil and distantly polite when the two Wizards meet face-to-face. There are rumours to the effect that Mr. Malfoy has been nursing a romantic torch for some dozen years for Mr. Potter, and witnesses do report that this is decidedly so, although their personal history whilst in secondary school at Hogwarts was volatile. Mr. Malfoy has made no effort whatsoever to draw Mr. Potter's attention in a romantic sense, but has been observed to be occasionally involved with Wizards who share attributes with Mr. Potter. Thus, it is likely true that Mr. Malfoy maintains deeper feelings for Mr. Potter, as has been reliably reported by M13 agents Zabini and Parkinson, Nott, Thomas and Weasley (Charles, who operates covertly out of our Romanian office.) This information may prove to be key or it may be merely tangential.

0O0

The Zoo at La Palmyre was a lovely, well laid-out place, and known internationally for its breeding program. Draco's imperative was to _cavort_, whatever the Hades that meant, in the company of suggested rhinos and gorillas. Which is what, likely, led to his surreptitious entry into the gorilla's habitat and thus what led to his cowering in the semi-open cave provided the inhabitants for privacy from pesky tourists.

It was smelly, uncomfortable, cramped and horrid. The Dampener throbbed in his pocket like a toothache, and Draco deliberately didn't examine his motives for foolishly placing himself in danger too closely. For he had, and it was bloody stupid of him but still preferable to the rhinoceroses, which had horns. Just because they were humankind's close relatives, biologically, it didn't mean the gorillas would take kindly to a human dancing about their private enclosure, however. Or merely shrinking in fear, awaiting one the of the Zoo's handlers to notice his predicament. Likely, Draco mused, he'd have to spend a great many of the Muggle Euros to get himself out this one.

"Graaahhhh!" one the males growled and swung himself closer, his long arms muscled like...well, like a gorilla's. "OOOgh!"

"Eeep!" Draco replied, and plastered himself against the faux rocks, in order to make himself the smallest possible target. "Bastarding homunculi! Why can't you speak French? Go away, I say! Shoo! Be off!"

The gorilla ignored him and his frantic gyrations with typical French panache.

"Ohhhh-Ahhhh!" sounded from the other curious apes and "Oh, merde! D'you see that man?" exclaimed a group of passing international tourists, drawn in by the rising level of Draco's protests. "Is he mad?" they wanted to know and Draco could've told them, 'Yes!'

He was, emphatically, and it was his job to be so. He'd been told to cavort and he'd bloody well cavorted. In the noonday sun, even. Oh, rued Draco, the barmy things he did for the sake of a steady paycheque and the comforting prospect of a future ambassadorship!

In the old days, Draco would've kicked up a fuss like there was no tomorrow. He'd been spoilt then, and used to being defended by others. In this instance, however, he'd only himself to rely on, which meant he'd have to escape all by his lonesome, using his native wit, as the gathering group of murmuring tourists was doing absolutely nothing useful, such as perhaps summoning a handler armed with a trank gun. Sodding useless Muggles!

Fucking Screwbik!

To that end, Draco inched up the not-rocks, as there was simply no way out other than up. The gorillas had him surrounded. The larger male ventured closer yet, 'OOOggh-ing', and hefted a hunk of fermenting watermelon. Draco, making a sudden break for it, skinnied atop the rockpile that comprised the cave, heedless of his Armani suit (the most appropriate attire he could locate for zoo-visiting in his evil Muggle luggage), and reached out gingerly for a nearby tree branch. It was a straggly one, located just on the other side of the fencing, and there was some rather nasty barbed wire and jagged glass shards in the way, but he'd always been relatively spry and fear did a great deal towards improving one's flexibility, as he'd previously discovered.

"Oooo-Oooo-Oooo!" yodelled the gorilla, in primal challenge, noting that his tribe's unexpected guest planned a quick and impolite departure. "Argh-OOO-errrr-ahhh!" And flung the melon with deadly accuracy, which then naturally struck Draco squarely across the nape, soaking his hair and jacket with sticky juices and dazed fruit-flies.

Hastily, Draco leapt up off his toes and grabbed at the beckoning branch. The next second he'd squirmed and wriggled his way onto it, over it _and_ the fence, and then nearly off it again altogether, when his perspiring palms slipped. A flailing manoeuvre kept him attached solely by the mercy of Merlin and he hung there, panting, long legs swaying forlornly in the chilly damp breeze.

"Gah!" Draco huffed, having assessed his new situation vis-à-vis safety. "Shite!" He was facing the wrong way 'round, sod it!

_Alright, alright_, Draco told himself. _Steady on, mate. _

He simply had to inch his way to the trunk in a backwards motion like a sloth, twine all his limbs 'round the sparse branches, swarm down the swaying tree and then he'd be home free, easy-peasy. Resolved, and trying to feel at least slightly positive about the whole situation, Draco gathered his strength. Mission had been accomplished, after all; he was no longer in immediate peril from death-by-enraged-apeman. It was only the prospect of his neck snapping when he descended from the tree to concern himself over. 'No biggie', as Mr. Weasley had told him the Muggles said.

Sod that!

The branch he hung from like some wayward holiday ornament chose that moment to creak ominously, which was just Draco's usual luck. The original gorilla, plus three others, slightly smaller but still armed to the teeth with their leftover luncheon, swarmed up the painted rocks shrieking and "OOOOing" and began pelting the tree— and Draco—with a ragged buffet of fruit and veg choices. Also, gorilla droppings, of which there were plenty, for variety's sake.

"Merlin's bloody bollocks!" Draco swore nastily. "I'm fucking well resigning, the minute I'm out of this! Fucking MACARONI! Sodding Screwbik! _Stupid_ Weasley!"

"Really, Draco?" drawled a well-remembered voice. "You don't say?"

"Harry!"

"Need a hand, Mister-I-have-a-very-important-appointment? Or are you just ducky on your own?"

"Harry, go the fuck away!" Draco hissed. "I'm perfectly fine!"

"Uh-huh," Harry nodded agreeably. "Just peachy, Draco. I can see that, you know. Not that _I'd_ chose that particular vantage point to view the captive Silverbacks myself, but to each his own."

"Shut up!" Draco ordered and began his inching. The branch dropped an inch or two of its own, leaving his stomach above his head for a shaky moment. Draco swallowed, cursing gravity, which was a Muggle invention. "Oh, shite, shite, _shite_!"

"Certain you couldn't use a little assistance there, Draco?" Harry had his hand on his coat sleeve, an instinctive motion which quite made it impossible for Draco's gut to ever resume its happy home within his swaying body. He choked, deathly afraid of what might happen if Harry unknowingly used magic on him.

Things would go very, very badly—of _that_, Draco was certain.

"_**NO**_!" he shouted, jiggling about on the thin, whippy branch. "No, Harry! I've got it—see?"

He began a frantic hand-over-hand in reverse, as if he were traversing a high wire or the monkey bars in some bass-ackwards Muggle cinema farce, and thankfully the branch steadied as it thickened and ceased with its infernal noises of internal shattering.

"Please don't!" he added, having reached the point where he could wrap himself 'round the slim tree trunk. "Oh, Merlin, _please_, Harry! Don't even think about it!"

"Ooooh!" exclaimed the useless tourists, who'd been watching pop-eyed all along.  
"C'est étrange! He iz craaazy!"

"What's all this, then?" demanded a zoo employee, bustling up a fraction too late and minus his trank gun, in any event. "What is going on here, gentlemen?" he inquired, shooing away the crowd.

"Oh, fuck!" Draco muttered, and slid down the trunk, rucking up his knees and the skin on his palms and ankles as he did so. "I am sooo very, very fucked."

He gasped, staggered away from the trunk, hair sticky and upper half liberally festooned with smeared papaya and...other...unpleasant things. What he wouldn't give for a good Scourgify!

And now, Draco realised, he had to get himself out of this imbroglio; _tout de suite_, as he'd heard tell French prisons were not preferred Muggle tourist destinations. Not to mention what would happen to his career, should this incident ever make the _Prophet._

"Come, now, Cousin Frédéric!" Harry exclaimed loudly. "Enough of your nonsense!" He strode forward and grabbed Draco's grubby arm. "Please excuse us, M'sieur; my cousin's easily over-excited," he informed the frowning zookeeper urbanely, whilst describing a discreet and universal circling motion 'round one ear with his pointed forefinger. "We must be going, Frédéric," he urged, glancing meaningfully Draco's way and forcibly tugging him into tow. "Right now. We're terribly late for administering your daily dose of happy pills and you know how you like those, don't you? The Happy Pills? _Cousin_?"

"Ah, er?" Draco gawked, and then twigged it, abruptly. "Cousin Gaston! You've arrived! You've come to retrieve me!"

He capered just a bit, in the best house elf tradition, as everyone knew house elves were both mad and mostly harmless, as well as bloody useful, and he'd no other point of reference for being charmingly barmy and notably off his nut.

"Happy pills, Gaston!" Draco chortled, scampering after Potter with alacrity. "Oh, take me away from all this, do! My friends the apemen won't play with me! They're soo cruel! Frédéric is soo sad, Cuz! You don't know how sad Frédéric is!"

The zookeeper stood well back and motioned them both along hurriedly, a reluctant sympathy dawning on his stern face.

"You may go, sirs," he allowed gruffly, "but don't come again without your medication, please," he scolded Draco. To Harry, he nodded ever so faintly and issued a quiet, '"Je te dis merde!"

"Merci, M'sieur," Potter smirked in return. He frowned at Draco and began a fast frogmarch to the car park. "But come, dearest Cuz," he ordered, overcoming the giggle that threatened with a manful struggle. "Let's return to the hotel now, shall we? Aunt Ernestine awaits us, and then you may have a nice long soak in the bath, and a restful nap, after luncheon."

Draco continued skipping; he felt it was in character. Also, Harry was dragging him along at a great pace, and he had to nearly sprint to keep up.

"What are you doing here, Potter?" he demanded, when they reached the Ferrari. "Oh, don't stuff me in there—you'll ruin the upholstery. I'll summon a cabbie."

"No, you won't, Draco," Harry stated firmly and proceeded to insert Draco into the passenger side rather forcefully. "There's spells for this—"

"No!" Draco shrieked, jerking away. "No! No! No! Absolutely not! No spells! Not near me! Don't do it, Potter; I'm warning you!"

"Why ever not?" Harry asked reasonably enough, sliding deftly behind the wheel. "We're Wizards, remember? Why wouldn't we use spells?"

"Because—because!" Draco gasped, fumbling for any reasonable (or even irrational)explanation. "I'm allergic! That's it. I mean to say. The thing that's wrong with me. I'm allergic to magic, Potter. Had an illness recently—odd side effect, you know—of the medication. Passing but very virulent! On medical leave from the Ministry. So—no spells! D'accord? Capiche? Got it?"

Potter gazed long and hard at Draco's pleading face, his expression skeptical. He nodded at last, slowly, bright eyes assuming a reserved glint. "Right, then, Draco. No magic. Whatever you say."

"That's right, Potter—whatever I say, and _I_ say it's fine, and you can just drop me anywhere near a taxi-stand any time now. I'll be perfectly all right. I've my luggage and I'm done here, in any case."

"Where _is_ your luggage, for that matter?" Potter demanded, preparing to merge onto the motorway. He avoided addressing Draco's demand altogether, Draco noticed. "Did you stash it somewhere? Such a nice set, that; Gucci, isn't it?"

'What? _**No**_!" Draco gabbled, practically plastered his eyeballs to the window, searching for a suitable place to exit the sex machine as the town of La Palmyre appeared before them. He couldn't bear another moment of this; he really couldn't!

"Look, I don't know Muggle, Harry! I don't follow every little fashion trend they have— don't have the time. Er, please. You mustn't concern yourself with my fucking luggage, alright? I'll deal with it—it's fine. And you mustn't concern yourself with me, either. Now, about dropping me off—"

"I will—in the loo at the hotel, Draco," Harry replied, primly. "As soon as possible, trust me. You stink."

"Git! I do not!" Draco jerked his chin around to give Potter the Look.

"Prat. You do. You need a bath—like yesterday!"

"Prick! That's my business, Potter! Keep your damned nose out of it!"

"Twat! Whatever _were_ you thinking, Draco, climbing about in a gorilla cage? Are you so bored with your life of minor diplomacy you have to end it?"

"Hardly!"

On the verge of spilling his guts to Potter, because Potter was trustworthy _and_ used to weird things happening, _and_ would somehow totally understand Draco's current predicament, Draco stopped himself. Again.

He couldn't. That was the whole reason Weasley had chosen him, a diplomat, supposedly schooled in discretion. Always, always able to defuse a situation. Always able to pull off a polite lie, with dignity. No, he couldn't confide in _anyone_ concerning the situation he was in, not even 'Hero Harry'. And he must remove his admittedly somewhat malodorous person from Potter's side instantly. All his clambering about with the gorillas could've damaged the Cube's protective Muggle case.

Draco glumly contemplated the suddenly very real prospect of Squibdom.

"Look, just drop me off somewhere, will you?" he requested, subdued, all his normal fire firmly doused. All very well for _him_ to become a Squib, but Harry couldn't. No fucking way. "Anywhere will do. I'm really not in the mood for company right at this moment, Potter, and especially not yours. I'd much prefer to be left to myself, thank you."

"Ah," Potter blinked at the macadam rapidly rising and falling under the sex machine's tires. A lovely view sped by, entirely disregarded. La Palmyre proper was just around the corner. "I see. Right. Whatever you wish, Malfoy."

"I do wish, thank you," Draco reaffirmed quietly, blind eyes fixed on the rapidly passing and pleasant scenery. He didn't; in fact, he wished nothing more than to return to the very nicely appointed suite Harry had booked in and indulge in a long, relaxing soak, and perhaps even enquire of Harry if he might be interested in washing his back later. Because he did stink, Draco knew, and in more ways than one. He was rank with lies of omission and half-truths and sodding secrecy and that was no good at all if he were trying to impress Potter.

But he wasn't ever likely to impress Potter, in any case; not unless he became an Ambassador, and perhaps not even then.

"Thank you," he mumbled, when Harry pulled the sex machine up with a jerk and a faint squeal of brakes. "Very much. Here will be perfect." The intersection in La Palmyre's main shopping district was crowded, even in March. People were going about their lives—shopping, strolling, talking— and when Draco opened his door, he was hit by a miasma of bustling small-town contentment.

And he could give a bloody Flying Fig about that, Draco mourned. It wasn't as if he were a _real_ tourist.

"Thank you, Potter," he repeated for the third or fourth time, fixing his face into a polite and bland company smile. "I'll take it from here. Have a safe and pleasant journey."

"Draco." Harry leant forward against the leather-covered steering wheel, frowning. "Are you certain?"

"Very—"

"Oi!" yelped a nearby policeman. "You cannot park that machine here! Move on, sir—please move on!"

"Certain, Potter. Yes, indeed! Right! Going!"

Draco nodded and smiled charmingly at _un policier_ and backed rapidly away from Harry's rented vehicle. He'd not be seeing Harry again, of course. Coincidence would only carry him so far, and he'd still the bloody Dampener in his pocket, and that stupid arse Screwbik hadn't bothered to rouse himself to relieve Draco of it, even when he'd been so actively cavorting.

"Carry on, M'sieur; excusez-moi!" he called out to the irked policeman over his stinky shoulder, firmly turning his back on the Ferrari and taking himself off to the opposite kerb, leather loafers squishing foully with every step. Behind him, he heard the low potent rumble of the super-charged engine revving and then the sports car was roaring away, leaving only a cloud of petrol fumes to mark its passing. Leaving Draco standing on the verge of a busy intersection, his potent BO—enhanced by the unmistakable scent of fresh gorilla excrement and rotting tropical fruit—threatening the noonday diners at the café that spilled out its rustic little wrought-iron tables all over the quaint cobbles.

"Oh!" exclaimed a matronly woman nearby, clutching her serviette to her nose. "La la! Quelle mauvaise odeur!"

"Taxi, taxi!"

Draco stepped forward hastily, flapping his befouled arm like a white banner, and got on with the exacting business of being a Muggle tourist. Nothing much else left to do, was there?

0O0


	6. Going Muggle!

HD The French Connection Part 6

0O0

Pity about not managing the rhinos as well, old chap, but I suppose the gorillas will have to do, at least for the 'cavorting' bit. Never did quite understand where the old blighter was going with that requirement, but that's geniuses for you: bleeding _inscrutable_, right? Haha! In any event, Versailles is next on your agenda; the Fontaine de Flora should be your final destination! Be sure to be present during the Grandes Eaux, as per instructions. Meanwhile, enjoy the TGV, and please do take notes on your overall experience for my Muggle Transport Trial Experience Record files [MUTTER]. They do say it's just the same as flying a broom. May I also say we're all very pleased you've met up with young Harry Potter? Fortunate coincidence, that. Do send Molly's love on to him and tell him to Floo the Burrow more often and not to be an absolute stranger. We miss that boy. And good fortune smile upon you, Draco. Here's hoping the transfer of goods will be successful! Best regards, Arthur Weasley.

0O0

Draco sneered. He sneered at the yellow Muggle telegram, mysteriously delivered _en route_; he sneered at his luggage, which was inexplicably scuffed and stained, even though he'd been most careful not to mar its finish. He sneered at his kneecaps and the endlessly uninteresting Muggle novel that rested atop them, and he sneered at the blur of trees, fields, hamlets, towns and motorways zipping past his window. He sneered at his pocket, wherein rested the source of his current misery.

He sneered because he missed Potter's company, not even two hours on, and because he'd not now have the opportunity for more of it. No doubt, things would be just as usual, once he returned to the F.O. He'd glimpse Potter only very occasionally, and Potter's mates would always be in flanking positions, and Potter himself wouldn't bother with seeking out Draco. He'd missed his chance, and now it was far too late to do anything constructive about it…all because he had to protect the damned Boy Wonder.

Pah!

Draco resumed sneering; to be honest, he'd not ceased for a second.

A half-hour later, he'd gathered himself together, at least enough to plot a sensible course of action.

The TGV Atlantic 8314 would only require two hours overall to deliver him to Paris, arriving at Montparnasse station in the late afternoon. He'd book into a room somewhere and, with luck, he could make his way to Versailles the next day via hired car and stand about by this bloody Flora fountain until something good finally happened; i.e. Screwbik the Inscrutable would fetch his bloody arse up and take away his horrid, evil, Magic-murdering device. And then Draco could snag an international Portkey back to London, same as a civilised Wizard, and then propel his weary bum back to his very nice flat in Belgravia, and fall into his very nice safe bed for a well-earned rest , far, far away from assorted sodding Prussian madmen and stray Potters in passing. Or he'd take a Muggle aeroplane, if he'd been Squibbed in the meantime and simply wasn't aware of it yet. And then return to the Manor and sob all over his mother's comforting shoulder.

But that was for later.

Draco sighed heavily, watching the world whiz by, and returned with a will to his habitual sneering. Bah! Life sucked!

0O0

A consult with the concierges of the SNCF left Draco in the possession of several key facts: one, he should bunk at L'hôtel Montparnasse Rive Gauche, which was quite close to Montparnasse station, and then take a local rail connection to le château de Versailles from there. Hiring a car or taxi would be murderously dear, not to mention wearing on his already overstrained nerves. Two, he should have another (lengthy) bath as soon as he booked in, as gorilla defecation was evidently a long-lingering odour and there'd been several complaints from the fellow travellers in his compartment. Three, he was effectively at a standstill in Paris till the weekend, due to the weekend-only scheduling of the Grandes Eaux during Low Season, and finally, there'd be no easy out for one Draco Malfoy, Junior Attaché, no matter how he might wish for it.

Fumbling out his remaining store of flimsy paper Euros, Draco was able to secure his hotel room at the Rive Gauche through Sunday morning; however, that was when he discovered the _other_ singular effect of Screwbik's monstrous little Cube: it rendered Muggle plastic cards entirely unusable. Wiped 'em ruddy clean as a whistle of all their Mugglish data. Not only did it Dampen Wizards, it also Dampened Muggle magnetic strips. Draco, standing forlornly before an ATM in the lobby, juggling the tiny scrap of parchment with his PIN number on it, had this effect demonstrated for him, after repeated fruitless attempts at coaxing yet more of those weird Euro notes from the recalcitrant machine.

"Card Error: Unreadable', the first written communiqué informed him dryly. "Card Error: Invalid' the second reported, not mincing its words, and the third missive nearly had Draco weeping in the lobby: 'Card Error: Card Damaged Irreversibly. Contact your financial institution.'

" Je suis désolée, M'sieur," the concierge stationed at the check-in clucked and then went on to advise him, when he showed her the slips of paper, seeking enlightenment. "You are, as they say, stranded. Have you no cell phone?"

No, Draco had no cell phone, and now he knew why: the Dampener wouldn't allow it to function, any more than it tolerated Muggle credit cards!

"May I borrow yours, then?" he wheedled, and for a small fee he was advised that was indeed possible - and then it struck him. He'd absolutely no clue how to contact the Ministry via Muggle means!

_Effing brill!_ Draco swore silently. Stuck in Muggle Paris with no Muggle money, no magic and no means of communicating with his superiors! He'd fucking starve to death, Draco fretted, and spared a passing regret to the sheer volume of Euros he'd pressed upon Henri, back in dear, old, quaint Trouville.

How in Merlin's Bloody Bollocks was he to pay for his rail pass to Versailles on Saturday? Worse than that, how was he to _eat_ in the interim? It was only fucking _Thursday_!

0O0

**To:** Minister Kingsley Shacklebolt  
**Status:** For Your Eyes Only  
**Dossier Document (Shred or Incendio after)**  
Draco Malfoy, according to Mr. Potter, is a versatile and highly intelligent Wizard. He is capable, able, adaptable and quick-thinking. He seldom allows events to prevent him from achieving his goals, despite indications of presenting a volatile personality. This last, of course, refers to his particularly strong emotional response to Mr. Potter. Nonetheless, Mr. Potter himself has recommended young Malfoy highly for a position in the M13, primarily due to these sterling traits of character, as Mr. Potter has expressed the strong opinion that Mr. Malfoy is quite capable of resolving unexpected issues on his own, with very little guidance necessary. 'Draco may be a prat of the first order and flighty as one of Luna's blasted Nifflers, but he's still rock-solid," Mr. Potter has stated in a recent interview, "when it comes down to the wire. I'd trust him with my life." This, Mr. Potter asserts, is supremely necessary for a covert agent, who may find him- or her-self in hostile territory, facing Dark Wizards/Witches at an extreme disadvantage and thus, in dire need of a dash of creativity to resolve apparently irresolvable difficulties. Mr. Potter, please note, had also expressed a sincere interest in partnering with Mr. Malfoy, should he pass the entry exam for admittance to the M13. That last, in itself, fairly well clinches Mr. Malfoy's potential career-change and acceptance into the Secret Service training programme. Mr. Potter _is_ known for his unerring instincts regarding character, as the entire British Wizarding community will attest.

To date, discreet observations of Mr. Malfoy continue. He is presently assigned the task of returning Mr. Chomondley Screwbik's device to him, and has proceeded thus far successfully. The Muggles he has come in contact with have reported only that he is somewhat odd and quirky, with a marked tendency to spend Euros as if they were water; they do not suspect at all that he is a Wizard, ferrying a dangerous Magical Object about his person. Further, he has gone out of his way to avoid contact with the Wizarding community as a whole and has even engineered a fairly polite parting of ways with Mr. Potter, under some personal duress. We have every faith Mr. Malfoy will deliver the device to Mr. Screwbik unharmed and without endangering any other Magical Being.

0O0

Draco had arrived in Montparnasse a little after two in the afternoon; his unfortunate discovery of his state of dire poverty occurred shortly thereafter. Head spinning, he traipsed off to his bespoke (and thankfully paid up) suite, toting his bloody school Muggle trunk-on-wheels behind him, all the while very leery of having to tip the officious bellhop who kept trying to take it from him.

One long and luxurious soaking bath, one small baguette, a half-bottle of cheap red table wine, a hunk of sharp cheese (all procured from the tiny café tucked 'round one of the many corners) and a frantic sort through his luggage later, Draco arrived at a possible solution. His actual luggage (which rolled, zipped, compressed, expanded, boasted numerous doodads and what's-its, and was featured in the Muggle men's magazines as being quite the premium of brands) was worth a fair amount of Euros on the open market. The Ministry had not stinted in his clothing or accoutrements, either. He was possessed of a leather billfold, a card case (empty), several belts, numerous pairs of Italian hand-made shoes, a sizeable chunk of Armani sport-and-leisure clothing from the most recent Spring Men's collection, and various ties, not to mention miscellaneous jewellery, such as cufflinks, clips and so forth, all contained in a smaller travelling case made of glove-soft calfskin. All of this, Draco determined, was saleable.

He set his chin, gritted his teeth and prepared to _go Muggle_!

An hour later found him on the Rue de la Gaîté, a combination ongoing street fair, open-air market and second-hand shop. Arrayed in the only pair of Muggle denims included other than the hideous ones he'd worn his first day (these new ones were a weathered charcoal in hue and quite tight about the arse, but far more comfortable), a classically simple Muggle-style white T-shirt which had likely cost the Ministry at least thirty Galleons, black Yankee-style Converse All Star high-top trainers (took him ruddy ages, doing up the laces), a dashing lime-green cashmere beret and scarf set, and lastly, a black leather bomber jacket against the chill of the evening, Draco proceeded to hawk his fashionable wares to the late afternoon browsers.

Had he wished, he could've sold himself, along with his possessions, ten times over. Evidently, Parisians of both sexes preferred long, cool blonds with haughty attitudes and distinctively English accents, all national enmity aside. Charisma was still an attractive attribute, and Draco had that, in buckets and spades.

"Non, non!" Draco repeated severely for the umpteenth time. "Take your grubby little paws off me, M'sieur!" He was not up for grabs; his luggage was! "Mademoiselle, I must insist! The denims are not for purchase! Nothing I'm actually wearing _is_! May I interest you in this lovely silk-weave jersey, instead?"

The close of the day left him, if not exactly rolling, but certainly more flush than he'd been hours earlier. Draco went off to his lonely bed in his Rive Gauche suite quite self-satisfied and much less famished, but then proceeded to toss and turn all night to steamy fantastical dreams of Potter purchasing _him_.

…And stripping him bare-arse naked, and shagging him silly, and…well.

_Fucking_ Dampener. _Sodding_ Screwbik!

Friday morning found Draco wandering the Musèe D'Orsay, marking time as a Muggle tourist. He strolled for hours, admiring the Art Nouveau and Deco masterpieces and the building itself, which was undeniably gorgeous. There were pieces of furniture on display that had him drooling over their curvaceous, flowing lines; bronze sculptures and sconces that left him dying to stroke their patinas, and the most stunningly lovely Pre-Raphaelite images of rather lovely Muggles all done up in oils and tempera, stained glass and other mediums, all of which taken together delivered Draco into a new appreciation of the state of the inner Muggle.

Emerging dazed and quite a bit more pleased with his lot in life into a lovely early spring afternoon, he was instantly commandeered into a pick-up game of bocce ball ('pétanque', they called it) by a gang of old men. The elderly participants took to him like ducks to water. Many of them were retired executives and professionals (just Draco's sort of Muggle) and Draco had an enjoyable time racking up some well-placed acquaintanceships and adding names of future _confreres_ to his little black book of potential political informants. Muggle diplomacy had become quite as important as Wizarding, as his co-workers and superiors back at the Ministry insisted on informing him. Now, at last, he'd have a leg up on the smarmy Ravenclaws who'd made his Very Junior status at the F.O. so difficult.

Regretfully, he made his excuses and, by the fall of early dusk, had fetched up at a small bistro in the middle of Le Marais, drowning his sorrows in yet another inexpensive house vintage and eying the predominantly male patrons with some small amount of trepidation. It'd been some time since he'd pulled a Muggle, but another night like the previous was not an option. His fecking balls were as blue as his mum's prized roses - even after two proper morning wanks, one still abed and one in the loo, under the shower spray!

'Course, he'd rubbed them both out over ever-more-lurid fantasies of Potter, but that was only to be expected.

Draco shifted his arse on the wrought-iron café seat he was lounging in and huffed, his grey eyes roving speculatively. _Needs must_, as the Muggles said. Draco _must_, or so he'd acknowledged to himself ruefully at four in the sodding morning, and here he was, at the Open Café, Rue des Archives, in the epicenter of la Ville Lumière's gay district, contemplating his undeniable _needs_.

What he really needed had likely already forgotten about their coincidental meeting. Or, if Potter did recall, it was likely with some disgust. Draco really had been rather odiferously fragrant when they'd parted. He sincerely hoped that arsehole Screwbik appreciated his continued personal sacrifices.

Across the room, however, there was this one brunet Draco noticed repeatedly out of the corner of his eye; couldn't help himself, really: a lithe, trim gentleman clad in a tight burgundy silk jersey, and one who boasted a beautiful back and nape and—Merlin's Beard!—sooty curls brushing golden skin; both just exactly the same shade as Potter's. Draco drew in a sharp breath and sat up, wondering if the man was already claimed for the evening. If the chap would only turn his head, Draco thought, he'd know whether the man lived up to the promise of his supple spine and Potter-hair. Draco's preferred choice of eye colour in his shags (a certain shade of toad-green one didn't stumble across often) was immaterial at this point. He was bloody desperate, after spending all that time trapped in a sports car with Potter. And a hotel suite. _And_ a train car.

Not to mention Hogwarts, but Draco wasn't prepared to dwell on ancient history. Not at the moment, at least.

Another, larger man hove into view and the burgundy-jerseyed honey-pot glanced up at him and must've have smiled most welcomingly, Draco concluded, because the second man (a bodybuilder type, Draco sneered, turning away automatically) promptly took the other seat at Burgundy-Jersey's table.

With a sigh, Draco wearily eyed the also-rans; those that were still gamely swimming, as it were, in search of the right hook-up. Perhaps one of those, then…

"Hullo, Malfoy."

Speak of the bloody, fucking _Devil_!

"How's it hanging? Still left of centre?" Potter inquired casually, and did his popping-into-existence act before Draco could complete either his gasp of disbelief or his generous slurp of Merlot. He promptly swallowed his wine down the wrong pipe and fell into a raucous coughing fit.

"What-wha-wah!" he hacked, nearly tipping over his wine glass. A few of the other patrons sent him sideways glares, apparently for attempting to shed himself of a lung in public. "Hoo! Po-Potter!"

"Yes, Draco. Potter," Harry replied, entirely calm in the face of a bug-eyed Malfoy, and blandly cheery, besides. Also, seemingly not all surprised to come across his old school rival smack in the middle of well-known gay bar at the heart of Paris. "That would be me."

"Po-Po-Potter!"

The Dampener thudded warningly against his ribs as Potter kindly patted Draco's back. Draco went pale, then red as fire, and then wan again, and none of it had to the slightest thing to do with the alcohol singeing down his windpipe or the fact he couldn't catch his breath. This was not at all what he needed shoved onto his proverbial plate. Not when he was just one short day from completing his first foreign mission!

"Go away, Potter!" he ordered shortly, just as he had after La Palmyre's little Zoo incident, and as soon as he'd gathered sufficient breath to do so. Draco would've liked to tell Potter to sod off for good measure, but he really couldn't afford to burn all his bridges, and certainly not with Potter.

"I've my eye on someone and I was just about to ... _wait_!" he exclaimed, fully processing the wine-coloured woolen weave Potter was wearing.

Gods, but what a very fit chest Potter owned, in addition to his lovely back and wide shoulders. It wasn't fair, Draco fumed… and it must be another of those lousy 'Card-read' errors. It certainly didn't compute. Potter, as far as Draco was aware of, didn't bother much with dating…though perhaps he was simply amazingly discreet about it. But at least not since that media debacle with the youngest Weasley, so far as Draco knew. Whatever! Draco was fairly certain Potter didn't date _men_, as there'd never been slightest scrap of evidence for it. He'd know if there was, if anyone did, given his extensive collection of clippings.

"What in the name of Salazar's serpentine willy are _you_ doing here, Potter? You _do_ know this is Le Marais, don't you?"

Le Marais was a district known for its homosexual flavour, true enough. Draco had been a few times, here and there, and mostly during his university days, though he hadn't made a habit of it, even then. Had to keep a low profile and be circumspect, after all, being a Malfoy, and that was all the more true after he'd landed his post in the F.O. The Ministry frowned on its Junior Attachés visibly gadding about with Gay Parisians and partaking in absinthe orgies and the 'high life', whatever _that_ was.

Draco wouldn't know; his goal had been to be considered as blameless as possible.

His goal was _still_ to be as blameless as possible. Ergo, Potter must. Go, that was.

Potter ceased his irksome noxious patting and promptly claimed the other chair at Draco's intimate built-for-two (or maybe a _very _cozy threesome) table.

"Share your wine with me, Draco?" he asked, and didn't bother to wait for a reply, pouring himself a glass and topping up the half-full one Draco was still absentmindedly clutching.

"But—but—but, since when are _you_—?" Draco began, still in the midst of frenetically sorting. "I mean, _really_, Potter. Are you sure you know where you _are_?"

Potter grinned at him, with a hint of that old Hogwarts challenge sparkling in his currently emerald-green eyes, and ran a hand through his shaggy but quite seriously sexy midnight coif.

"Of course I do, Draco. And call me Harry, please. I think we're sufficiently acquainted." He took a sip of his wine and regarded Draco through suddenly narrowed, assessing eyes, propping his chin on his fist. "Or we certainly should be, by now. How many years has it been, Draco?"

"Thirteen," Draco replied promptly, not even stopping to think about it. "Almost fourteen, really, since it's March already. More than half my life. And yours, prat."

"Fancy that," Potter smirked. Draco found that mannerism startlingly charming and then had to suppress his findings quite deeply, as the Dampener was round and hard in his leather jacket and Potter was a bloody Wizard. _The_ Wizard, in fact. Oh, _Merlin's Bloody Bollocks_!

"See here, Potter," he started grimly, back on track once more, "I really do have to ask you to go. I—I'm waiting for someone—someone special."

"You aren't," Potter stuck in instantly, his gaze segueing to slits of malachite intensity, "so don't lie, Draco. And if you were, it was me. I saw the way you've been looking at me. Plus, you wanked yourself blind in my hotel room loo in Royan. Don't tell me you're not attracted." He opened those eyes of his wide then and Draco was cast adrift on a sea of teal green.

He choked on his ruddy house swill for a second time. Or perhaps just on the air he'd ceased breathing. There was really no help for it. He had been doing exactly that— waiting for Potter—for nearly fourteen years now (as Potter had been just so kind as to remind him) and here was Potter right now, this very moment, smiling like sex incarnate. Smiling _at_ Draco, with a golden-flecked warmth in his snapping gaze that was very...very...entrancing.

"Steady on," Potter said, reaching across the microscopic table to whack Draco across the spine again when he began hyperventilating. "Don't want you incapacitated, git. I've great plans for you this evening."

"P-P-Plans?" Draco stuttered, and that was ridiculous in and of itself, as he _never _stuttered, and here was Potter, forcing him to. "What sort of plans, Potter?"

"Well," Potter drawled, and filled Draco's glass again to the brim. "Er, let's say...we should make our 'knowing one another' a great deal more Biblical. Like that."

"'Biblical'?" Draco drank deeply, hardly aware of what he was doing. His head was starting to spin and Potter's smirk—smile—_grin_—was intoxicating. "What does_ that_ mean?"

"It means," Potter replied, "that you're inviting me back to the Rive Gauche for a nightcap, Draco, and you may order breakfast for two from Room Service whilst you're about it." He drained his glass dry, rising as he did so, and Draco's eyes were caught and stuck fast to the line of Potter's gloriously lean throat, swallowing.

It didn't need a ruff or collar to be fucking gorgeous, Potter's throat; it just _was_.

"Nghh," Draco replied succinctly, and rose as well, in response to the insistent tug on his elbow. He reeled a bit as he came to his crepe-soles, amazed at himself for doing so, as he usually had an excellent head for his liquor. "Alright, but—" he replied, barely aware of what he was agreeing to, but knowing he'd kick himself black-and-blue if he didn't.

Fourteen fucking years was more than long enough to wait for what one had always, _always_ wanted. Wasn't it?

"I," he said. "But—_oh_!" he gabbled, blinking rapidly as his surroundings blurred a bit. When had the ground tilted?

"But, Draco," Potter interrupted him, throwing a small pile of Euros on the table, "_nothing_. Drink up and let's make tracks, shall we? We'll just make our connection if we hurry."

_That damned Potter_, Draco thought, _always so—so arrogant_! And valiantly attempted to lash up a proper fury whilst he thought it—_so stubborn, so hard-headed_! Just like a hippogriff in a scrying glass shop, prancing in roughshod and tipping all the fragile vessels right off their tripods!

"Now, hold up, Potter!" he sputtered, but Potter cut him off most effectively this time—by snogging him stupid, right there in the middle of the café. The interlude of spit exchange only heightened Draco's fear for Potter 's sake. "I can't—I mean I mustn't—you simply _don't_ under—!"

And then Potter was snogging him for an endlessly lovely eon, and waltzing him right out the entryway, and he was pressed right up against the dirty brick wall outside the café, having arrived there magically somehow, and much to the not-so-suppressed amusement of snickering passers-by and onlookers. They earned a few catcalls and even an '_Oooh_-la-la!"

Except of course not magically. There was the—the…there was that thing Draco had to deliver. No, actually, Draco's needs informed him sternly, there was Potter. Right here, right now: Potter.

"Mmphh!" Draco remarked, after a moment or two, not in the slightest bit interested in their surroundings any more. "Gra-phufffle! Po!" he added, happily, stupidly, and caught Potter's handsome face between his palms, simply to allow him to rub the tips of their noses together—a gloriously soppy something he'd always _wanted_ to do, instead of the usual breaking and/or kicking and punching activities of their long-ago pasts. "Mmmm, Harry. You're bloody fucking hot, you know that? I could eat you right up."

"See what I mean, Draco?" Harry asked, a dark eyebrow rising in a merry fashion, and he deftly caught hold of Draco's perspiring hand to lead him off to the nearby Metro entrance. "Our acquaintance cries out to be deepened—exponentially. Don't you agree?"

"Um," Draco nodded, rendered happily quiescent as they stumbled down the Metro stairwell. _Need_, his logical brain pronounced. _Must_, advised his throbbing chest…er, groin. "Point," he said aloud, nodding vigorously.

"Brilliant," Potter nodded meaningfully, "that's settled, then. Come here, prat."

Draco almost fell through the commuter train's hissing entry doors, he came so willingly—and wordlessly, unless one took into account the small 'meeps!' and groans they both emitted, their mouths fully occupied with something much more worthwhile than mere conversation. They snogged all the way back to the Rive Gauche, all through the endlessly eternal lift ride and all through the entire frustrating process of Draco's fumbling his unDampened Muggle keycard into the suite's door locking mechanism. He'd thoughtfully kept that safe in his Hi-Top.

"Wait!" he gasped at last, recalling his mission for MACARONI just as they burst through the minute entryway, still pressed together like insects to magical flypaper. "Just—just hang on, Harry! One moment, if you would!"

"You have lube in there, Draco?" Harry called out, as Draco bolted for the lav, frantic to ditch the Dampener and get back to Harry—because it was _Harry_ now, and not _Potter_. "Bring all of it—or would you rather just shower together?" he added provocatively, as Draco shimmied his narrow hips out of his tight jeans and tore off his jacket and T-shirt. "I'll bathe with you, Draco. Sounds rather nice, that...all wet and soapy and steamy-hot...with _you_."

"Oh—ah, er," Draco yelped faintly, distracted, busy with wrapping up the Dampener's red-and-white Muggle ball in every single towel available.

"Gods!" He stuffed the bundle containing it into the tub, and swished the curtain shut, nearly scraping his rigid cock raw on the edge of the thick plastic, and then stuffed the lav's bath rug and his own discarded clothes on top of the haphazard pile. If he remembered correctly, the Cube was limited-range; twenty paces or so, and could be itself Dampened.

"Please work, please work, please!" he muttered at the makeshift muffling device, and prayed to Merlin, Morgana, Salazar and every other major magical personage that his eidetic memory was correct, because now he'd finally tasted Potter's—_Harry's_—mouth, he was fucking dying without it. "A moment, Potter—just coming!" he called out, checking his teeth for stray spinach bits, even though he'd not had any with his dinner. "I mean, _Harry_—I'm almost finished up in here, I swear!"

"I sincerely hope not, Draco," Potter's voice replied, very close by and full of chuckle, and the doorknob rattled. "I wanted you to wait for me."

Draco shivered at the throaty laughter that reached him even though the door, relishing it as he slapped on cologne, brushed his teeth in three seconds flat and frantically smoothed his mussed hair. Harry Potter laughing and joking about comfortably in _his_ bedroom…well, his _rented_ bedroom, wasn't something he'd ever seriously believed he'd have the opportunity to experience. It was gratifying, that sound. More than that.

Grabbing the tube of Muggle lube the Muggle hoteliers thoughtfully provided, as well as a few of the complimentary foil-wrapped packets of sheaths to be on the safe side, Draco slammed back out of the loo at record pace, not forgetting to lock it securely behind him. It was a makeshift solution at best, barricading the damnable Dampener in the bathtub, and Merlin help them if either of them had to urinate anytime soon, but nothing—_nothing_—was getting in the way of this historic shag!

Not when he'd been waiting fourteen years for it—no! All his damned life!

"Harry!"

Dropping his acquisitions on the nearby king-sized bed, he snagged Harry by the shoulders and spun him into the wall.

"Oh, Merlin, Harry," Draco moaned, overcome by just the exactly proper shade of toad-green eyeballs, and threw himself right back into the most serious business of snogging.

0O0


	7. Le Match!

The French Connection Part 7

0O0

Saturday morning dawned chilly, sunny and clear, and Draco blinked himself awake to the sound of rushing water. It reminded him gently that the day would hopefully bring about the end of his servitude as Screwbik's lackey—and then it sent him barrelling right out of the hopelessly mussed bed.

"HARRY!" he bellowed, banging on the en suite's door. "Harry, get your arse out of there! It's dangerous!"

Terrified, he slammed his shoulder into it and battered away, well aware he didn't dare use even a simple Alohamora.

"Harry!" he shrieked, bursting in and nearly stumbling over the clotted ball of towels and clothes deposited directly before the lav's sink basin. "Are you alright? Speak to me, Harry!"

It was the worst bloody turn-of-events imaginable: Harry Potter, Wizarding Hero, trapped in a lav with a Magical Dampener that would turn him into a Squib as soon as look at him! Draco was frantic.

"What?" Harry poked his seal-wet head out from behind the semi-opaque shower curtain. Beads of moisture dripped down skin the colour of clover honey. Draco swayed where he stood, just from remembering the night before. "Hey, Draco! Good morning. Er—why'd you pile all the clean towels in the tub? That's a little odd, don't you think?"

"Get the bloody fuck out of there, Harry!" Draco barked, and latched onto his sometime lover like an eagle on a sleepy dormouse.

"Wait!" Harry struggled, blinking stray droplets out of his eyes with lashes that were ruddy broom bristles, they were ever so long and luxuriant. "What? I'm not done yet!" He flailed, slipping on the tub's shiny floor, and Draco simply reached out and grabbed at him, lifting him up and out. "I'm still soapy! What the feck are you doing, Malfoy?" Harry demanded, finding his wet, still steaming person suddenly dripping all over the refined plush carpet of Draco's bedroom.

"Oh. My," panted a grateful Draco, kicking the battered loo door shut firmly behind him. "Salazar! Spell something, Harry! Anything—I don't care—_No_! No, _don't_, on second thought! Let's go out for breakfast! Luncheon! Oh—"

He was panicking all at once, completely, having lost his head entirely. He couldn't abandon the Dampener and carry Harry away to safely check on the state of his magic; he couldn't abandon Harry, naked and wet in his room, and take the bloody fucking Dampener away to safely chuck the cursed hunk of gaily-coloured shite at Screwbik's bearded mad Prussian face, either! "Merlin! Shite, shite, shite!" Draco moaned, variously caught between a rock, a hard place, a blank brick wall and a large, obstreperous boulder.

Hemmed in, rather. Come ascupper! All at sea! And, too, by Poseidon, and not to think unnecessarily marine-oriented thoughts, but Draco desperately needed to make use of the damned loo for its original purpose!

"Shite! What now?" Draco demanded of no one in particular, hopelessly watching his potentially satisfying future sex life fall all to pieces, metaphorically.

"Right." Harry replied, after a long moment of quiet observation, during which Draco did a little dance of impatience and sheer anxiety. He grabbed the plush coverlet off the bed and tucked it calmly around him, smoothing his wet mop of hair back off his forehead while he was at it. The scar there practically blinked a neon warning at Draco, reminding him of all Harry had sacrificed to stop Voldemort. "Stop, will you? Draco?"

"You have to leave," Draco babbled, abruptly coming to a firm decision and standing as tall as he could, in order to enforce it. "Harry. Potter. You _must_. I'll—I'll Owl you later—or _something_, I promise, Harry, but right now, you have to go. Be off, depart, scoot! Shoo!"

"You're barmy, Draco," Harry replied, rubbing at his damp head with a corner of the fabric. "Inhale, will you? It's not the end of the world. Besides, I've already tested it."

"Go back to England, Harry, right now, this minute," Draco was in the midst of directing, his hands clenching and unclenching into fists, and pointing at the suite's exit when they weren't occupied with that, "where it's safe. There's some business I have to take care of, but I swear I'll catch up with you as soon as I possibly— _what_? Potter?"

"It's fine, Draco. The Muggle Poker Ball thingamajig works perfectly to belay the Hoovering effects of the Screwbik's Cube. There's no danger; there never was."

"Huh? Pardon?"

"You do spend a lot of your time gawping at me, Draco," Harry's face creased into a mischievous grin. "Fortunately, I find that attractive. I said—it's _fine_. There's nothing to worry about. Calm the feck down. Please."

"I..." Draco began, his inner wheels churning up various solutions to this puzzle and mentally comparing and contrasting them, whilst all the while Harry—_Potter_—grinned at him, like a fucking loony.

_Shite_! He'd been had! Hoodwinked! Deceived by a bloody Gryffindor!

"I fucking _hate_ you, Potter!"

And with that, Draco bolted for the toilet.

"_Potter_!"

And promptly erupted back out of it, two minutes later, wild-eyed and terribly relieved, for he'd the blinding revelation whilst staring blankly at the toilet bowl swirling itself clean that it was Saturday at last and he could finally palm off the horrible Dampener on the equally horrible Screwbik. His burden was about to be considerably lightened. "Potter!" Draco hissed. "Look at me, you arsewipe!"

"Erm, yes?" Potter looked up from sliding on his socks. His feet were long and boney and Draco spared a thought to licking them. "What's up, Draco?"

"You are absolutely, beyond any reasonable doubt, certain this thing is safe?" he asked, dragging his thoughts away from poking his tongue in between Potter's toes and caressing the tender skin he'd find there. He waved the red-and-white Muggle Poker Ball that held Screwbik's Cube. It rattled.

Potter shrugged casually and nodded, reaching for his street-stained trainers. "As safe as I could possibly make it, Draco. Had to use it on occasion, you know. Wasn't about to let it latch onto me. Be bad, that."

"Very bad, indeed, Potter." Draco nodded firmly in return; the Muggle guidebook had stated the Grandes Eaux was set to go off at five p.m. at Versailles on the weekends and hols. As of 4:59 p.m. precisely, he planned to be standing penitent before the Roman goddess Flora, awaiting release from his enforced Muggledom.

"Right! Excellent, in fact!" he barked, and turned away to gather his own clothes from his greatly reduced wardrobe. "Step lively, Potter. I'm treating your lying, deceiving arse to that late breakfast I've mentioned and then we're off to have a little sightseeing tour over at Versailles. No reason you can't be in on this, since you seem to know all about it already, wanker."

The last was accompanied by a little glare over the shoulder and Potter, to give him credit, did have the good grace to blush.

"Oh, um," he mumbled, most definitely shamefaced, "about that—"

"Save it, Potter," Draco ordered. "As soon as we've tidied up that loose end, I fully expect a decent apology on yours. That wasn't bloody fair of you, git, leaving me in the dark like a bloody mushroom. You could've trusted me." He scowled, wheeling away. "At least a little."

Potter rose and crossed the room in what seemed like just two strides, he was so quickly pressing Draco's half-garbed form up against the wall by the bathroom. Draco swallowed when their hips budged tight together and actively willed himself not to melt. He was, he reminded himself, righteously wanked off at Potter.

"That's just the thing, Malfoy. I do," Harry said, his voice urgent. A soft, rough brush of his lips across Draco's left him sighing and concluding melting wasn't all that bad a fate; the weight of the Dampener in his trouser's pocket had reduced itself to nearly nothing. "I truly, really do."

Draco blinked; once, twice, and fixed Potter with as baleful a Look as he could summon whilst attempting not to caper about his suite like a ruddy fool. Even if his insides had turned to sodding candyfloss, he didn't have to show it.

"Glad to hear it, git," he replied, gruffly. Though likely Potter could tell how much that meant to him. "_Finally_."

"I should hope so," Potter replied equably, stepping back at last and gesturing politely towards the doorway. "As it's bloody true. After you, Draco. I've more plans for you, after—and an apology owed. Let's make this snappy."

Draco flashed him a grin, threw on a shirt and stepped into his own Muggle trainers. There was an added insouciance to his step when he exited that hadn't been there for ages. Nothing like having the Man of the Hour admit one's worthiness and dependability to one's very own face. _That_ would be one over on those damned Ravenclaws!

0O0

Alas! It was the Low Season; no waters flowed through the Fountains of Versailles in late March, except on state holidays and it wasn't Muggle Easter for another week. Draco and Harry were reduced to standing about by a voluptuous Flora Fountain sadly dull and placid without the plash of falling liquid. The walk through the various parterres and elm-lined paths had been pleasant, though taken at a very fast clip. And stalled, frequently, by bouts of impetuous open air snogging.

Draco, disappointed to learn he'd not have the chance to witness Le Grande Eaux after all, was even more eager to be shed of his burden and spell himself into regular Wizarding gear. Harry, it seemed, was exceedingly anxious to make him that apology he owed and move on to his aforementioned 'plans', judging by the way he kept devouring Draco's lips whenever they came upon a private place in the Palace or the Gardens. There were, as it turned out, a great many private nooks and crannies in Le Nôtre's famous formal Gardens and they ended up being both sidetracked and pleasantly forgetful, what with the lack of proper breathing technique. Thus Screwbik (a florid, purple-apparelled man who emerged from one of the intersecting paths like leftover party guest transported magically from the Reign of the Muggle Sun King), though vastly crucial a personage and the whole point of Draco's romp through Muggle France, was politely brushed off as soon as he'd taken his bloody Cube back in hand.

Whole 'transfer of goods' took five minutes, tops, and left Screwbik nearly swallowing his tongue and murmuring, "Potter! Wasn't that Harry Potter?" over and over. For Draco, it was five minutes too long, though.

"Oh, I say, young Malfoy—may I call you Draco?" Screbik began, striding right up to Draco and possessing himself instantly of Draco's hand. "Draco, then, it's a fine piece of stealth work you've done these last few days—proud of you, I was. Let me tell you—very proud! Good-oh for the old Ministry, right, what?"

Screwbik liked to chat, Draco learnt immediately. He'd begun after the initial introductions and hadn't stopped since. Currently, he was in the midst of loquaciously congratulating Draco for all his efforts, exclaiming over the weather, the state of his beloved dog, the plans he and his wife had made for the next stop on their sentimental second honeymoon tour de France and so forth. Had, in fact, gotten himself rather lost in an ocean of flowing periods.

"Thank you, sir, and now we must be going," Draco required only that the man swiftly depart so he and Potter could return to snogging—and then move on to fucking. Fucking and Paris went together like wine and cheese. Champagne and Brie.

"... as I was just Owling Arthur the other day ..." Screwbik was still babbling on. He was a veritable magpie, Draco decided, and opened his own mouth for the fifth time to put a stop to it. Harry was visibly fidgeting, standing off a little ways from the two of them and pacing back and forth like the proverbial panther. "Always glad to be of service to the Ministry folks—do my duty to the homeland and all that—"

"... another appointment waiting, sir; I'm sure you understand," Draco gamely attempted to fob the mad inventor off yet again.

".. the crucial importance of timely inventions is the lifeblood of the Ministry's programme for updating ..."

_Blah, blah, blah_, Draco thought impatiently. _Do shut up!_

"Draco!" This from Harry, who'd sloshed his way into the fountain pool, tired of waiting about for the business of transferring to conclude. "Draco! Look at what the sodding tourists have done! There's Muggle money here, tonnes of it—come see! You should have come here first before selling your clothes!"

"... and then Arthur was just remarking to Violetta—that's m'wife, you know; dear girl, headstrong, has this awful cat—that my Cube was _crucial_ ..."

"Prat! Don't touch that! It's likely dirty!" exclaimed Draco, watching Harry bend over with a salacious glaze tinting his gaze. He blinked and instantly remembered the inventor, who was going on about Borzoi and their many attributes. "Sir!" he interjected loudly, "you must excuse my poor cousin, sir; he's a bit touched since our Aunt Ernestine passed. Do pardon us now, and have a safe journey, sir, and a wonderful second honeymoon. On behalf of the Wizarding government, your Item was most appreciated and terribly necessary, but we simply _must_ leave you now—"

"Harry Potter!" Screwbik burbled, turning to watch Draco's progress. "Oi! Isn't that Harry Po—?"

Draco had meanwhile made his leisurely way into the fountain, taking time to Charm his shoes and trousers dry as a bone to spite the chilly water. He stepped in, with panache, and slogged his way over to Harry, who was bent over still and rooting about for coins at the bottom of the Fountain.

"Gaston, you silly arse!" He flapped his hands at Harry, herding him along. "Remove yourself from here at once! It's _not_ a ruddy wading pool. Come along now!"

"But isn't that Harry Pot—" Screwbik asked again of no one in particular. "I could swear I've—that's—right?"

Harry stood up straight, splashed across the small gap that separated them and latched his lips onto Draco's open ones without a second's hesitation. Screwbik finally ceased bleating. The bronze goddess Flora was impassive, naturally. No waters ran, but certain other things flowed, in a generally upwards and outwards direction.

"Mmmm, Harry..." Draco breathed, and buried his quivering nose in that hair.

"Gaston, Cuz—remember?" Harry grinned, and tightened his hold 'round Draco's waist. "Best cousin ever_ I_ had!"

Draco, flushing pink with what might've been embarrassment but was more like overflowing lust, spared one more passing glance at the goggling garrulous inventor just prior to an impatient Potter turning on his sodden heel and Apparating them both away, blessedly shed of the Devilish Dampener.

"_Kissing_ cousins, Mr. Screwbik! Kissing!" Draco sang out in the scant seconds remaining before they tumbled into a blissfully horizontal cushy and most importantly _shagworthy_ receptacle—his hotel bed—at last. "The British Wizarding government thanks you again, sir! Au revoir!"

0O0

The maids had been and gone; the newly freshened sheets beckoned and Harry and Draco wasted no time squirming on them and twisting them all to Hades.

"Want you," Harry ground out, and straddled Draco whilst he was still frantically tugging his clothes off.

"Want you _more_, Harry," Draco moaned back, and gave up on using his fingers. A Nudicum spell had them both naked as babes in a blink. Draco, fighting to get as much of his naked person plastered against as Harry as he possibly could, rolled them over again and proceeded to nip and kiss his way down the skin he'd become addicted to in less than twelve hours.

"So good," he muttered to himself, concentrating on leaving marks to prove he'd been, "oh, so fucking _brilliant_!"

"Mmm," Harry moaned, and allowed Draco to have at it, unchecked. "It's all—" he gasped, "at your serv—ah!"

"Give me," Draco growled.

He fell on Harry's dick like a starving man on a banquet, and Harry arched his hips up, scraping the tip of his cock across the ridged furrows on the roof of Draco's swallowing mouth, tossing his dark head from side-to-side in a frenzy when Draco hummed.

"Draco!" he cried out—and then positively yelped his lover's name when Draco's long fingers pinched the very base of his swollen prick. "_Draco_! Bastard!"

"Not yet," Draco growled, "not without me, Harry—not ever again!"

"Then fucking _do_ me, git!" Harry pleaded, scrabbling at Draco's fingers with his own, "or suck me or—or _something_, but do. It. Now! Let me come! I need to!"

"Patience, Harry." Draco went up on his knees, keeping Harry's hips clamped tight between them and his own punishing fingers in place. "All in good time."

"I don't have time to be patient, idiot!" Harry gritted and fixed Draco with blazingly brilliant eyes. "Are you that angry with me for not saying anything before? 'Cause I'm sorry, Draco; really I am—"

"Oh, Harry!"

Draco wasn't angry—well, a little miffed, perhaps, but it was clear Harry hadn't been lying by omission simply because he liked taking the piss. No... Draco was more..._determined_. That was it: determined. Harry needed to understand fully what he'd gotten himself into, accepting a Malfoy into his life..and his bed. Malfoys were possessive by nature, and terribly territorial. He knew; he'd grown up as one.

"_Accio_ pillow," Draco ordered the bed. One promptly zipped right on over, hovering politely. "Here, Harry. Budge your arse up, will you?"

Harry groaned something that sounded a lot like 'Finally!" and Draco grabbed his knees, shoving them back so that the backs of Harry's thighs met his flexing chest.

"Want me to rim you?" he asked him wryly, scooting his own knees forward enough for his prick to nudge familiarly against Harry's hole. "I can, you know. I'm very good at it, Harry," he teased, but they both knew it was well past that, now.

"No!" Harry grunted, and glared at him, peering through slits of poisonous pea green. "Just get in me, twat! I'm tired of waiting."

"Are you certain, Harry? It'll be very vanilla, you know—just regular old boffing." Draco grinned like a bloody lunatic and stuck a careless hand on his dick to aim it, Muggle lube slopping. "And I've not stretched you properly, either. It'll be tight as fuck."

"Just. Do. It!" Harry ordered, and wrapped his legs round Draco's waist, hauling him closer. "You can move on to all that fancy shite _later_, Malfoy! Just get in me, will you? I like tight and I like burn, damn it! What're you waiting for, laggard?"

"Glutton for punishment," Draco murmured, and did exactly as Harry asked. His lover moaned as he slid in, jostling about a bit and grinding his hips to-and-fro in an effort to widen Harry's narrow channel as he went. The subsequent drag-and-clench was horribly constricting, wince-evincing and utterly sublime. Draco closed his eyes because he literally couldn't keep them open. Potter had sucked him in—lock, stock and barrel.

"Bloody Hero," he grunted, in quiet admiration. "Feel like a fucking virgin, you do, every time."

"Mmmmmm," Harry was both panting and purring beneath him, his throat humming with a sweet growl that inflamed; hips in a constant simmer as Draco eased in, swaying with tooth-grinding restraint. "My specialty. Oh, um, Draco," he added, voice lazy with pleasure as Draco's cock found its mark: Harry's prostate. "Thass'pperfect! Right there!"

"Yes? Nice and slow, then," Draco bit out, barely breathing. "I can do that." It was an exercise on self-control, and he could only focus on the extenuated drag, back and forth, of his prick sawing in and out of Harry's arse. It was an excruciatingly gorgeous view, his blonde pubes meshing into Harry's dark curls, and Draco committed it to his photographic memory in a series of portraits he'd not ever forget.

"Merlin, Harry—you're gorgeous!" He couldn't help but blurt it out; likely he'd admit to more scurrilous tripe just like that as he grew used to the concept of shagging Potter on a regular basis.

Harry smirked at him, tipping the mood back from dreamy to competitive. "Am I, now? Thought I was a little git?"

"You're not going to hold every foul word I ever said to you against me, are you, Potter?" Draco demanded instantly, though he never ceased the slow rock of his hips against Harry's arse. "Because you've done your own fair share of mud-slinging—and I don't mean metaphorically, either, Potter!"

"No, Draco, I am not," Harry was quick to reply. "I'm just—well, I'm just amazed, a little. I didn't really think you'd, er, um, how shall I say it?"

"Gag over you, Harry?" Draco suggested, both brows aloft and waggling in a wry leer. "Wank to your stupid _Prophet_ pictures and the sound of your stupid voice on the wireless and every stupid memory I've ever had of my skin touching yours directly, even if it was only tussling with you over some idiotic schoolboy insult? Because I _do_, Harry. Wank. _All_ the fecking time."

"Yeah?" Harry's eyes were slowly closing, the lids drifting down as Draco increased his pace. "You do?"

"Yeah," Draco rumbled, and succumbed to the call of the expanse of Harry's throat. He loved the swallow; it made him entertain exceedingly lascivious thoughts. He loved the way the tendons and veins were there, ripe beneath the skin, and how proudly Harry carried his head, even now. "I do."

"Draco," Harry mumbled and turned his jaw, so he could lap at Draco's ears and his tumbling hair, tasting it. Draco groaned.

"Tell me you won't change your mind, after," he demanded, hauling his face away from Harry's fascinating one with effort. Harry blinked at him, confused. "When we go home," Draco clarified, "tell me you'll still—it's not just a holiday thing, is it, Harry?"

"No," Harry said slowly. "It's an ever after thing."

Draco could practically feel his face cracking; his lips were stretched so widely. And likely he looked daft as ruddy brush, but who cared? "You mean that."

"I mean that."

"Well...me, too." Draco flushed, but his gaze was steady, though his respiration rate certainly wasn't. The rocking never stopped.

"I know, git," Harry smiled, and the misty-eyed glance he gave Draco in return belied his super-casual tone. "Now, d'you think you could fuck me for real, Malfoy? Because I still owe you an apology."

"Fourteen years worth, Harry," Draco shot back, never one to be found at a loss—at least, never again. He accelerated, rearing higher up on his knees and gripping Harry's firmly. "You've been rude to me that long, at least."

"Uh!" Harry grunted. "Shut _up_, Mal—"

"_You_," Draco shot back and then took care of silencing Harry himself.

0O0

Congratulations, young Draco, on successfully completing your first mission for the M13! Welcome aboard, as the Muggles always say! Wizards say that, as well, but I meant it in the Muggle sense, as you'll be having a lot to do with them now, won't you, as a full-fledged covert agent? Dear old Chom Screwy (he was two years before me at Hogwarts and Head Boy, don't you know?) was very pleased his precious Cube was delivered to him in perfect condition. The Minister also sends on his best regards, son, and sincere thanks for 'services duly rendered'. Also, we'll look forward to having you and Harry at the Burrow for this Sunday's dinner, don't forget! Four o'clock, sharp. Molly likes guests to be prompt. Lastly, this telegramme will self-Incendio in just seventeen seconds, beginning count-down as of now. Please place it safely away from your immediate vicinity and stand well clear. Cheerio!  
Signed, Arthur Weasley, Director, M13 & MACARONI and Managing Director, OPART.

0O0

"Stop bending me over the back of my own chair, Harry!" Draco implored. "It's bloody demeaning!"

"But I like it, Draco—and so do you, prat. Don't complain," Harry puffed in his ear.

"But I have a sofa!" Draco pointed wildly, losing his somewhat desperate grip on the rolling seat as Harry pounded him. "Right there, git-for-brains! Installed for the express purpose of —of—_ah_!"

"Yes!" Harry gasped. "Draco!"

"Harry!"

"Want! _Need_!" Harry ground out, arching his gorgeous spine and giving Draco's cock that last wrist-flip, the finishing touch that always sent Draco bloody stratospheric. "You! _Git_!"

"Oh-gods-oh-gods-oh-Merlin! Shite, shite, _shite_, Harry!" Draco gabbled. And came like the bloody Flora Fountain, all over his gathered 'Top Secret' dossiers and the brand-new set of gold-inlaid quills his proud Mum had given him to celebrate his elevated status as a Secret Service agent. Or perhaps it was to celebrate his six-month-steady relationship with Potter, Harry. She wasn't supposed to know about either item, actually, but mothers, it seemed, knew bloody everything.

"_Coming_!"

0O0

**To:** Minister Kingsley Shacklebolt  
**Status:** For Your Eyes Only  
**Dossier Document (Shred or Incendio after)**  
Mr. Malfoy, as you're aware, has signed off on the documentation, and has been formally accepted into the M13 division. He has taken up a partnership with Mr. Potter, as was Mr. Potter's original goal. The gentlemen are currently awaiting their next covert assignment in their new offices, located in the central MACARONI division and beyond that, have taken up co-habitation in Mr. Malfoy's Belgravia townhome. The other M13 agents have accepted Mr. Malfoy into the fold wholeheartedly; in fact, it is reported that Mr. Malfoy had to double-ward his residence against an overly enthusiastic Ms. Parkinson.

This concludes the observational report of the Detailed Operation Obtain Malfoy (or DOOM), as originally submitted to yours truly and duly executed by Agent Potter. Please be assured you will be kept abreast of any future developments on that front.

P.S. On a more personal note, Sir, it is also rumoured that Mr. Malfoy is very taken with the division's motto and has had it embroidered on all his bath towels. He has also taken like a mallard to a moat his recent prolonged exposure to French Muggles: he Portkeys every Friday afternoon, along with Mr. Potter, to play a game known as 'bocce ball' with a group of elderly French gentlemen; mostly recently retired Captains of Industry and Movers-and-Shakers in the Muggle world, I believe. Mr. Potter is said to win the actual games more often than Mr. Malfoy does, which is the one known bone of contention between them. However, this is _not_ considered a major cause for concern, Sir. They seem to carry on most happily and efficiently as partners—and woe betide the next You-Know-Who!  
Toodles! Arthur

[Carry on then, Muggles! Damage a femur, alright? Signed, Sincerely, Secret Agent Tigersilver, M13 Coven Special Ops, _Bollixing Up the General & Garrulous Editions of the Reported Realities of the Everyday Muggle _Division(BUGGERR'EM)]


End file.
